


Under The Red Hood

by DoomBeThyName



Category: DCU, Justice League Dark: Apokolips War (2020), Justice League vs. Teen Titans (2016), Teen Titans (Comics), Teen Titans: The Judas Contract (2017)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-01-22
Updated: 2021-01-25
Packaged: 2021-03-14 09:02:58
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 6
Words: 21,358
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28918038
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DoomBeThyName/pseuds/DoomBeThyName
Summary: Before- the brave and bold Titans adventure to world-saving tasks weekly, confidence filling their gusto to the brim, and Raven enjoys a nice life. She has a home in the tower, friends that border family, and a certain someone she's been trying to figure out how to make more than eyes at for some time now.After- Nothing is ever the same...
Relationships: Dick Grayson/Koriand'r, Kon-El | Conner Kent/Donna Troy, Raven/Damian Wayne
Comments: 3
Kudos: 38





	1. A Death In The Family

**Author's Note:**

> Hello everyone! This is a story that is every bit the same as the original I posted in my one-shot series. But I'm making my longer ones into multi-chapter pieces now because I've been longing to redo the endings to these. I've loved writing them, but once I began crossing the 20k word border, I just wanted to finish and chuck them out. So now I'll be taking the time to properly do them. I hope you guys will read!

There was a groggy silence that usually maintained during the early hours of Titans Tower, so Raven wasn’t surprised to find the kitchens full of bodies and simultaneously absent of life.

Garfield, Jaime, and Conner all had their heads banged on the counter like schoolboys hoping to snooze away unnoticed in the first class of the day. Donna, trying earnestly, had her head up at least, resting on a hand propped up by her elbow, but she too had her eyes gently shut. Raven exchanged a small look with Damian, who was already donning his Robin attire and looking as though he’d been awake for hours, as he was watching over a stainless steel kettle on the stovetop. Raven caught a whiff of the aroma.

“Matcha?” she asked, pulling her hood down.

“Pennyworth swears by it,” Damian explained simply. He turned to catch her eye again. “Grab us a couple of mugs?”

Raven kept her face composed as she grabbed a couple of the ceramic mugs she liked from the cupboard and pulled the honey from the pantry, feeling Conner and Donna now peeking their eyes open, watching them. Raven kept her back firmly to them as Damian lifted the kettle up and filled their mugs.

“Hopefully Starfire sees their state as anodyne,” Damian said in a very audible whisper, “and not as a revolt against early morning training.”

“They’ll come around,” reassured Raven, sipping her tea. Unexpectedly, she quite liked the bitterness of the matcha.

“Good morning everyone!” sang Kori. She was far too loud this early for Raven’s liking. Looking over her shoulder, she watched a light-hearted Starfire quickly become dejected and confused at the sight of her sleeping team.

“What’s wrong?” she asked worriedly. “Are you all not well?”

“Star,” groaned Jaime, looking up at Kori with bleated red eyes, “it’s still dark outside.”

“Nonsense,” argued Kori, pointing out the window. A skinny haze of pink could be made out on the far horizon, nearly over encumbered by darkness.

“We have to acclimate our bodies to be in peak form throughout all times of the day,” said Kori briskly. Raven and Damian continued to sip their tea peacefully.

“Come on guys,” said Donna, slouching off the counter without enthusiasm and grimacing, “let’s get going. We can’t put it off any further.”

“That’s the spirit!” said Kori enthusiastically, squeezing her fists to exude power and readiness. Raven smiled weakly.

“Has your boyfriend made it back yet?” she asked, taking her eyes from Damian, who was disposing of his cup.

“No,” answered Kori, “Nightwing is still training Titans East.”

“Why does there need to be a Titans East again?” asked Conner groggily, rubbing his eyes. “The East Coast literally has everybody. Batman, Superman, Wonder Woman, Flash is there, three freaking Green Lanterns.”

“He’s right!” chimed in Garfield, popping up suddenly. “We should just bring Titans East over here and make them our morning crew.”

Kori seemed to be struggling to argue with points well made, so Raven decided to intervene for her friend.

“There’s no such thing as too many heroes for everyone,” she said, “besides, we’ve got this area covered better than Superman or Batman ever could.”

She noticed Damian raise a quizzical brow, but hope he didn’t decide to interject something snarky.

“You’re right,” agreed Conner, pushing himself up with his eyes still barely open, “I’m the best. Let’s do this.”

“You’re the best at flying straight into walls and causing us property damage maybe,” Donna rolled her eyes. Conner scowled at her.

Damian took Raven’s empty mug with a soft hand, their fingers brushing together. She kept her eyes squarely down at his chest as she thanked him before whisking away quickly and throwing her hood back on to hide any blush.

~

Training hadn’t gone the smoothest for some.

Boys versus Girls never worked out well. They nearly matched Raven, Donna, and Kori in strength, but lacked team coordination. Damian and Conner worked well together as did Jaime and Gar, but as a whole they fell apart and thus could never take advantage of their three-on-four battles.

As Kori yelled for a halt, Raven and Donna dropped to the ground next to an unconscious Superboy.

“And this is the guy girls everywhere have a poster of,” said Donna skeptically.

Raven glanced up at Damian approaching.

“Reminds me of your seventeenth birthday last year,” she said, reminiscing. Though she felt him sour and aggravated with yet another defeat (Girls, 22 – Boys, 0), a crooked smirk came to his lips. Raven’s heart (though she would never admit it) sped up.

Donna snorted. “Oh, right. We go through all that trouble of finding out when his birthday is, what kind of cake he likes, if he _even does_ like cake, and throw him hat surprise party all to have H.I.V.E Five ruin it. Still, at least Conner got knocked the hell out.”

“I heard that,” mumbled Conner weakly, eyes still shut tight in pain. Donna giggled.

“That was a fine session everyone,” spirited Starfire to them all. “Garfield, your transformations have been more seamless than ever. Beetle, your sync with the Scarab has also been far more succinct. Damian, great work as usual.”

Damian took the compliment without a nod or shrug. He sheathed his blade and began walking away. Raven watched his black cape sway for a moment before receiving a nudge from Donna.

“Are you two ever going to talk about it?” she mumbled to Raven while smiling.

Raven’s eyes popped, but brought back her calm demeanor quickly. She knew that Donna had suspected her affections for some time now.

Gesturing wordlessly as though it were a decision she didn’t know or care to act on, Raven gave a fleeting glance Damian’s way again once Donna, smugly smirking, turned away. At the same moment she did, Damian reached the doorway to leave and looked over his shoulder, catching Raven’s eye. Surprised, as if though he’d been caught peeking himself and it wasn’t the other way around, he jolted and left at a quicker pace.

~

A cold breeze had drifted in that night when they received a distress call. Raven watched intently with her arms folded, standing next to Damian, as Kori debriefed them.

“It’s about a hundred miles off the coast,” she told them seriously, “Brother Blood has set up a secret operation disguised as an oil rig. We don’t know what they’re actually mining for, but our information tells us they’ve kidnapped a tourist boat.”

“That’s a hundred and twenty-seven lives,” further detailed Jaime, scanning over the dialogue of the radio in.

“And their safety is in our hands,” said Kori, looking fierce. “Most of us will take the jet. Keep it high in the sky, there’s plenty of cloud coverage tonight. Conner, you and I are going to lead the way out front, taking point and getting as much recon in before we engage. It’s time we bring Blood in for good. Titans, go!”

~

Damian was the only one who knew how to operate the Titan’s jet as well as Nighwing or Starfire. Raven watched over his shoulder as he flipped switches, initiated the thrusters, and activated ‘ _Stealth Mode’_.

It was a very dark night indeed. An overcast covered the sky and the cold January weather created fog off the warm water down below. Then they broke through the first clouds shortly after liftoff, unveiling an infinite amount of stars.

“This never gets old,” grinned Donna, looking up out the window. Her eyes dazzled even without starlight helping them shine.

“Try to keep focused,” advised Damian. He exchanged a long look with Raven. He was always so intense for missions, no matter how routine for them it was.

_“The place is crawling with bad guys,”_ came Conner’s voice some time later. They could just hear him over the wind roaring by his communicator. _“I see the abductees. They have them huddled near the middle like a bunch of cattle.”_

“Suggested points of entry?” inquired Damian, flipping more switches.

_“North-East,”_ said Starfire’s voice, _“there’s a heavier concentration that way. They have no reason to know we’re coming. Get in fast, strike hard, disrupt everything they’re doing.”_

“Sounds like a plan to me,” said Beast Boy, looking as ready as any of them. He placed a hand on Raven’s shoulder, looking out the front with determination. She glanced at him in surprise. A flicker of irritation felt in the air caused her to glance at Damian then, but he was studiously staring forward as well.

They’d come upon it. It looked like Castle Dracula in the sea, sprouting up like an evil beacon from the depths. Spotlights from the top of the outer walls were searching both the skies and waters for possible intruders at any time, but Damian kept them well enough out of sight.

“Ready to engage,” Damian communicated with Kori once they’d gotten close.

_“Alpha Strike Force ready.”_

“Oh, Conner,” Donna rolled her eyes.

_“Keep the jet active and on stand-by, Damian,”_ Kori told him, _“just in case we need a quick exit.”_

“It’ll go off without a hitch,” said Damian as he did as was instructed, “we’re the Titans.”

“You’re starting to sound like Conner,” Raven mused as he stood up. He gave her a smile and carried on, Raven keeping right at his side. Just how they normally fought.

“Remember to keep count, hermano,” grinned Jaime, suited up and looking sideways at Gar, who grinned in return.

“You act like you can touch this,” the changeling taunted.

“You two are seriously turning this into a competition?” said Donna incredulously.

“Just keep focused,” said Damian shrewdly. They stood by at the ready near the hangar door. He pressed the red button and it dropped open, letting in the freezing winds.

_“Go!”_

Raven grabbed Damian’s hand and pulled him along. They were close enough to the top of the wall where she’d be able to let him go quickly. Donna zoomed past just as Conner made contact with several of Blood’s soldiers just down the way. The rest of the team could hear him laughing.

“Hey jackasses, over here!” Donna yelled, crashing down with a force that shook the fortress-like wall. Several guards fell to their backs. Raven launched Damian, sword out already, near the Amazonian. He landed, tucking into a roll, and sprang out of it swinging. Once Beetle and Beast Boy finally joined the fray, the H.I.V.E troopers began dropping like flies.

_“Raven, if you can, get to the abductees. The sooner they know they’re safe, the better.”_

Raven casted rain of mystical bolts down upon their enemies calmly with one hand. Their blasters bounced harmlessly off of her glowing aura. She glanced towards the middle where she saw green energy bolts flying around sporadically.

_“Down three floors below, dead center,”_ came Conner’s voice in her ear.

_“Thirteen,”_ Beast Boy grunted over comms.

_“Sixteen,”_ came Jaime’s.

_“Twenty-one,”_ said Damian unexpectedly.

_“What?”_ yelped Garfield. _“You cannot be outdoing me.”_

_“You don’t even wanna hear my number, boys,”_ came Donna’s voice. Raven smiled, but drew her mood serious again towards the middle and dove.

A battalion met her along the way as she zoomed through the corridors. She took them out as quick as possible, only taking little care as to not kill.

_“Hey guys, trot carefully into crowds,”_ said Jaime over the communicators, _“it seems they’ve got heavier artillery than usual.”_

At that very moment, the entire fortress shook with some explosion. Raven glanced up in worry, but hurried along to her goal faster. She could sense all of the fear and dread just ahead.

“It’s the witch!” one of the guards shouted as she approached. “Grab the senses destabilizer-“ but Raven blasted him against the wall before he could continue and quickly cleared out the ones he’d been with. She paused for a moment. They’d had something ready for her? If they were prepped for her, then that means…

She glanced up again in worry. Her team was now in imminent more danger. They had to get these people to safety and get out- fast.

Raven used her energy to pry open a vault like door and gasp.

It was like a cage for feral animals. Well over a hundred people, scared, abused, and bleeding. So frightened none said a word at first. Immediately in front of Raven, there was an elder Latina cradling a small child, bleeding from the side of her face.

“They said they were going to sacrifice us for Brother Blood,” a man near the front whispered tremulously. It appeared as if had a gun-shot wound to the hip. Raven could feel his life draining. “They already took some of the others…”

Raven nodded. “You’re safe now,” she told them, “no more harm will come to you.”

It looked like that statement did very little good to the bleeding man and several others around him. These people were already beaten and battered, on the verge of death. Raven gritted her teeth and opened her comms.

“Found the abductees. They were going to be sacrificed to Blood for his immortality and it seems they didn’t care who they lost along the way.”

_“Get them to Jump City Methodist,”_ ordered Starfire, grunting as she threw out another blast.

“No,” Raven answered, “if I bombard the hospital with this many bodies, they’ll never make it around to everyone in time. I have to do what I can to help now.”

_“Do what you must, Raven. But hurry! Donna is under heavy fire and we’ve lost track of Damian.”_

Raven’s heart seized for a moment. How the hell had no one mentioned that yet? She stared around at the heart civilians, trying to refocus on her task.

“Okay,” she loudly called out to them all, “everyone who is seriously hurt, come forward.”

Unfortunately, it seemed to be several dozen of them. Raven’s teeth clenched harder. She didn’t know if she could heal them all. But she had to try. Instructing the group of the badly wounded to link arms, Raven chanted her mantra.

“By the powers of Azarath, I beseech you. _Azarath, Metrion, Zinthos_!”

Audible gasps filled the room as mystical energy lit the wounded, glazing over the injured parts of their bodies. She could feel it working effectively.

And her energy rapidly draining.

Many different thoughts came to her head. A variety of backgrounds from lives she’s never known flooded her. A woman crying as her husband slammed the front door on his way out of her life. A boy crying in class from being bullied by everyone else. A young girl running away because she was being picked on for giving another girl a love letter for Valentine’s. An elder man losing his mind as a small coffin lowered into the ground.

“Agh!” Raven yelled in pain once the healing had been complete, collapsing to her knees, legs as numb as could be momentarily. None came to her aid in worry. They were just happy to be better.

“Everyone hurry,” Raven groaned in a low voice. Sweat beaded down the side of her face. From the floor, she opened a portal out front of everyone, who gazed at it in wonder for a moment.

_“Hurry!”_ Raven roared.

They scrambled forward, rushing to get out of Hell. As the last person, a small girl who looked back at Raven in concern, made it through, Raven dropped her energy and felt totally and utterly depleted. She pressed her communicator.

“Abductees alive and out,” Raven muttered. She fell over, holding her hands out to catch herself. Grimacing in pain, she stared down at the floor as her sweat dripped off her skin. Out of everything going on around her, it was a miracle she could feel someone approaching. Raven glanced up as the vault door opened and revealed Robin.

“Here, let me help,” he said, taking her gently by the hand and pulling it over his shoulder. Holding her side as they began to make their way up, Raven took the moments to look sideways at his steadily focused face. It felt like she was given a free pass.

“How is everyone?” she mumbled. To her fright, Damian grimaced.

“Not well,” he admitted seriously, “Conner got hit bad. Blood has somehow been able to manufacture weapons coursing with kryptonite for his goons. He’s out cold. Starfire and Beast Boy got hit with heavy shots, they’re wounded. We got the hostages, but Blood is going to get away this day. I’m getting us out of here.”

Raven coughed, and was sure she tasted blood in her mouth. Feeling Damian’s worry now becoming a little overpowering, she glanced back at him.

“I’m strong enough to make it,” she assured him, “I just need to get back and rest.”

“Matcha tea,” Damian tried soothing her thoughts. “Wuthering Heights.”

Raven huffed a painful laugh. “You’ll read it to me as I ly in bed.” 

They walked on for a moment before Damian answered quietly.

“Whatever you want,” he said. Raven couldn’t find it in her to meet his gaze right then. The moment felt too intense. Too revealing…

Breaking their way through to the top, they still heard fighting going on. Donna was an absolute warrior, throwing half a dozen men off her at once and punching away an energy blast with her bare fist.

“We need to get in the jet!” she yelled as soon as she saw them. Then her eyes widened as she took in their state. “Raven-“

“She’s fine!” Damian yelled. “Let’s go!”

Donna stiffened and nodded. She provided them cover as Damian trudged Raven and himself over to the jet that was hovering clumsily over the edge of the wall.

“Is that Garfield driving?” Damian muttered to himself.

“Is that really what’s important right now?” Raven asked before grimacing again. Jaime was there reaching out to them with a black rope from the hangar doors.

“Take her,” yelled Damian. Raven didn’t want to let go, but he pushed her off of him, practically lifting her up for the rope. She took it and allowed herself to be hauled up.

“ _No_ ,” Raven said in a hushed voice as she entered the jet. Conner was stagnate laid out on the floor and Starfire was sitting against the wall, breathing shakily and holding her bloody side, sweating profusely.

“How the Hell were they able to prepare so well for us,” growled Jaime, as Damian climbed up the rope, “we had the drop on them!”

“Leave it for now,” Damian spat, then turned, and shouted, “ _Donna_! We are _leaving!”_

Donna whirled towards them and began bulleting over just as a voice yelled, “Do not allow them to get away!”

Raven recognized the booming, commanding voice of Brother Blood. She peeked her eyes, which were shut in pain, to see Blood and his gathering forces quickly assembling with blasters pointed their way. After everyone they dropped, how did he still have this many men?

“Garfield,” commanded Damian himself, watching Wonder Girl fly closer, “on my mark, close the hangar doors.”

Beetle morphed his right arm into a canon and provided some cover fire. Robin threw out explosives that flew over Donna into the oncoming crowd of enemies.

“Now!” he shouted.

It happened in slow motion in Raven’s eyes.

She just happened to be watching Brother Blood as he pulled a blaster rifle from one of his soldiers and took steady aim. Raven was so delirious she thought she was seeing two of him.

Donna zoomed inside of the jet, perfectly timed with the hangar doors starting to close as they began pulling away, Beast Boy yelling he was about to just punch the thruster because he wasn’t that sure what he was doing.

That was when it happened. Blood took steady aim, the look of a professional marksman, and fired.

Damian’s head snapped back. That was the terrifying moment for Raven, just knowing he’d been hit at all. That Damian had been harmed. The amount of blood that immediately followed stopped her heart.

His body went limp and crumpled to the floor, falling forward. Raven’s yell hadn’t even alerted the others yet, who just hadn’t noticed until it was too late. Robin, not a thing going on inside his mind that Raven could feel, perhaps stunned, and, as the jet went skywards, limply fell forward and out the hangar door before it closed shut. Raven dove forward in an insane state, failing to get to the outside. Her hands landed on the cold metal.

“Garfield!” Donna screamed in horror. “ _Stop! Turn this thing around! Turn it around!”_

“I don’t know how to!” Beast Boy yelled back. “There’s a battalion back there! What happened?”

_“DAMIAN!”_

“I don’t know how- what do I do?!”

Raven jolted forward as the thrusters kicked into higher gear, zooming miles by every few seconds. Emptiness screamed inside of her as everyone screamed at one another. She still couldn’t quite comprehend it. Shocked reined in her mind and she couldn’t find the control of her powers to do anything. Thoughtlessly, she surged forward again, perhaps going to rip the door from the hinges and fly back there. She knew he was alive, she just knew it. Before she could, Jaime’s strong arms wrapped around her.

“He’s gone,” he said in her ear, mortified, “and the rest of us will be too if we go back there. You don’t have your strength right now Rae, and he just fell two hundred feet… he’s gone.”

And Raven closed her eyes, feeling water built up between their lashes, and let out a cry as every bit as ugly as she had the day she lost Azarath.

~

Starfire had wrapped her torso up and wanted to jet straight back there. Donna was willing to follow in her stead. But their faces said it all.

Hopelessness was felt all across the room. And inside Raven was hollow. They stared at the floor. At the wall and at the ceiling, but never at each other. When Conner came around, he threw the living room sofa through a wall.

None of the Titans slept that night. None of them turned on the news to see the dashing headline _‘Teen Titans Rescue Leagues of Hostages Again!’_ For they just didn’t care.

They did go back. In the morning. They willed themselves to complete a recovery mission… and failed.

The Titans searched the entire area within three miles for his body, seeing Blood’s company had removed themselves from the premises. Raven hoped he’d still be alive, camped out somewhere on the rocks, staying out of sight. But she felt his life presence nowhere near. He was gone…

The worst part was perhaps, other than Raven’s own tumultuous pain when Starfire told Nightwing face-to-face. His jaw had dropped. His hands went through his hair. He pounded the wall so hard it cracked, anger at himself coursing every fiber of his being for not being there.

Or the worst part could have indeed been hearing Batman’s reaction. Seeing his face as Bruce Wayne, every bit as empty as the coffin they buried. For what is worse in life than having to bury your child…

Raven tore off her clothes of grieving the moment she got back to her room from Damian’s funeral and curled up on her bed over the covers. She felt as though nothing else mattered but to wait, wishing the monotonously over-bearing pain would end. Knowing her heart would perhaps never stop feeling so cold…

“ _Damian_ ,” she whispered to herself, another tear of many that had come falling down her face.


	2. Life... Tried To Find A Way

_Three Years Later…_

Raven opened her eyes wearily to brighter light and louder noises than she was expecting. Blinking out the sleepiness, she sat up in bed and looked around her apartment bedroom. Her eyes first found the light coming from the outside and realized how late she must have slept in.

“Oh, damnit,” she groaned. She wasn’t doing herself any favors by having an apartment of her own if she couldn’t make it to Monday morning training on time.

She reached over for her cell phone charging, which had just quit dinging, knocking into her wine glass by accident. She unhooked the device and peered at it, already undoubtedly knowing who was trying to call her.

Seven missed calls. Two from Kori. Five from Garfield. Three texts. One from Kori. Two from Garfield.

_Are you well? Will you be able to make it?_ – Kori.

_Why aren’t you answering my calls tonight? What’s going on?_ – Garfield.

_Where are you?! Training is going on NOW. Come on, Rae. : (_ \- Garfield.

Raven sighed sadly to herself. She stared at the phone a moment longer… and just blacked out the screen, opting instead to roll out of bed and head for the shower. It was 10:13 already. Their eight o’clock practice ended almost a quarter of an hour ago.

So much for a strong start with the new members of the team, she thought to herself. Dropping her sleeping shorts and pulling off her shirt, she twisted the hot water handle and felt bliss at the sound of the pressure it exuded as the shower roared to life. It felt even more wonderful than it sounded. She needed this.

Another text shot to her as she brushed her teeth, but Raven didn’t check it, wanting to put it off as long as she could. She pulled on a cleaner pair of the small shorts she liked and a hoodie over her top. Her hair was still wet from the shower as she picked up around her apartment.

With a frown, she picked up an open bottle of wine from her kitchen table and found it was one of the ones she’d got from Bruce this past Christmas. _Chateau Lynch-Bages, Fifth Growth._ It was still half full. She hadn’t drank much, how did she forget to cork it back up?

Her eyes sadly gazed over the label. She knew how, of course. Raven’s mind had definitely been elsewhere last night…

Gazing out of the large windows looking over the bay of Jump City from her kitchen and living room area, Raven heard the cold winds of the start of the year whistle pass with dismay.

January was an eternal black spot on the calendar for her…

Raven started as she heard a knock of her front door. Pouring out the remaining liquid, which smelled spoiled for sure, and disposing of the bottle in the trash bin first, she opened the door up and tried not to grimace.

Garfield was standing there in an orange pullover with the hoodie up over a ballcap keeping his green hair and face mostly covered, holding two cups of take-out coffee. He was wearing a frown.

“I know you normally prefer tea,” he said slowly, “but after the night I reckon you had, I thought coffee would be better.”

“Tea is caffeinated,” she said thoughtlessly, still standing in front of the doorway. Gar looked away from her, dejected. Raven shook her head, placing fingertips on her temple, upset with herself.

“I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have-“ she tried, but bit it back, going for a friendly smile as she accepted one of the cups from Beast Boy and stood to the side to let him in.

“Thank you,” she said. Garfield went for a smile as well, but Raven still felt his spirit was down. In an attempt to upheave it, she sipped from the cup enthusiastically. It was disgusting.

“I needed this,” she lied. Garfield felt slightly happier as he sat down at her table. Then he seemed to be surreptitiously glancing around for something.

“I didn’t have a crazy night,” said Raven, now not feeling as bad that she was being checked on. Whatever they were, that wasn’t up to him to do.

Garfield at least looked repentant. “I know, I know. I’m sorry. I know that…” he looked down at his own cup before he finished, “that you just wanted to be left alone.”

The silence hung heavily in the air before Garfield spoke up again.

“So what did you do?” he asked, trying for a chipper tone.

“I-“ Raven thought it through in her head before admitting, “I did have some wine last night. Watched some tv. Enjoyed the quiet. Normal stuff.” She pushed out a chair for herself and joined him. Sour mood seemingly gone, Gar happily drummed his fingers on the table.

“Catch that whale doc I told you about?” he asked, his canary yellow eyes sparkling. Raven gave in and smiled back.

“Not yet,” she told him, “but I will. I have a list on my watch-next group that I never really get time to binge through.”

“Maybe we can go through it today,” he said hopefully, leaning in, “if you don’t mind I… stay over?”

Raven did her best to look downtrodden.

“I can’t,” she said, seeping false sorrow into her tone, “I told Kori I’d meet her for lunch today.”

Gar looked confused. “She didn’t say anything about meeting you at training today.”

“I imagine other things are on her mind at training, Gar,” Raven said quickly, “I was actually getting ready to go meet her now. Thank you for the coffee though. I really do appreciate you thinking of me.”

“How could I not?” wondered Garfield mystically. He laid a hand on top of Raven’s that wasn’t holding her cup. She returned his smile half-heartedly.

“I’ll get going then,” said Gar, standing up. Raven stood with him, but didn’t expect it when he came close.

“See you soon though?” he asked, some worry in his eyes as he wrapped a hand around the low of her waist.

“Definitely,” Raven answered. She met his lips when he leaned in closer for a kiss. Looking satisfied, he departed, not noticing the sadness hidden well in Raven’s eyes.

She quickly picked up her phone and texted Kori.

_So sorry I missed training, Kori. Meet me at Icharo’s for lunch? My treat._

_~_

Icharo’s was a new ramen joint downtown that Raven especially liked. The food, the aesthetic of the dark grainy wood mixed with hand drawn art from Japan’s culture, and of course Icharo himself, it was one of her usual go-to’s in Jump City now.

“My usual spicy miso,” waved down Raven as she took a seat on a stool at the counter.

“Chicken ramen for me, Icharo,” called her oldest friend’s voice. Raven looked to her left as the towering Koriand’r took a set by her and gave her a smile.

“I really am sorry for missing training this morning, Kori,” apologized Raven first, but Kori easily dismissed it with a hand.

“We had enough going on with a new Flash too eager to do everything at once and Donna’s little sister Cassandra joining the team. They won’t be debriefed for our next mission, anyhow. We’re not taking them so inexperienced.”

“We have a new task?” asked Raven as a waitress set out some cold sweetened tea in a glass for them.

“There’s been strong activity between Santa Marta and National City,” informed Kori, “even Jump City is being affected at the docks. We’re dealing with someone that seems can’t be traced unless they _want_ to be found. Mob bosses throughout the state are knuckling under him as some new tyrant. We barely even have a picture of this guy. Leather jacket, weird red helmet. But we’ll fill the team in tomorrow.”

“We’ve seen them all before,” said Raven dryly, only half paying attention now. Remembering last night, green eyes flashed in her mind’s eye again.

“That we have,” Kori remarked, “none quite had an army behind them like Blood…” Realizing what she inadvertently brought up, Kori shot a look at her friend and quickly said, “It seemed Garfield was eager to get to you after training. Did he make it to your place or get caught up feeding some ducks along the way?”

“Gar came by,” said Raven steadily, hoping her eyes gave nothing away, “he brought some coffee, we talked. It was nice.”

Kori stared into Raven’s eyes with those green globes for a moment, and then-

“ _Raven_ ,” she sighed, setting her drink back down.

“Please don’t say it,” muttered Raven, but of course, it being Kori, she said it anyways.

“I was nothing but alone when Dick and I broke it off,” she said somberly, “but I still had the responsibility to tell Jaime no when he advanced because even though I wasn’t taken, my heart was. And it isn’t fair to lead anyone on like that.”

“I like Gar,” Raven argued weakly. “He’s such a good guy. I don’t know if I’ve ever met anyone more pure and innocent.”

“Sunshine can’t fight an eclipse,” said Starfire sadly, twirling her drink with her straw. Raven studied her for a moment.

“I saw Dick at the Wayne Manor Christmas party,” said Raven slowly, “he and Barbara weren’t there together. I mean, they were both there, but I don’t believe they attended as a couple. She tried to corner him, but I saw him slip away and out the back.”

Starfire maneuvered her lips just enough to fight off a smile, probably trying to focus on something else in the room. But she couldn’t hide the satisfaction and small elation she felt from Raven.

“He should settle down with someone if they make him happy,” Kori said, twirling her drink again. Raven almost scoffed.

“Yeah,” she agreed, smiling as she thought of how bubbly they were together, “he should.”

“How was Bruce?” asked Kori, her voice in a much more pleasant tone.

“Well,” answered Raven, happy with the change in direction, “I think he’s with Selina Kyle again. Their arms were linked at the party. And it was his first time seeing me post twenty-first birthday, so he had no disregards treating me like a fellow wine critic.”

Starfire laughed loudly as Icharo sat down the bowls of ramen in front of them. Raven thanked him politely in his native tongue.

After they ate and said their goodbyes, Raven took the long walk back to her place, somber thoughts filling her head again.

All of the trysts she’s ever had. A line of mistake after mistake after mistake…

Still to this day, she felt regret for that night two years ago when she drunkenly gave her first time to Conner, whom she then awkwardly avoided for a month. What filled her with remorse even more was what that had done to Donna. Hurt beyond belief, she gave Raven a cold shoulder for almost three weeks after that, not even glancing her way.

Then there was Jericho right around Valentine’s last year. At a snow-capped fortress where they started enjoying the amazing view over the clouds a little too much together, what she best recalled was earnestly leaving before he awoke. He had never been a part of the team anyway, but the Titans definitely saw him less often after that.

And now here she was running around with Beast Boy. She felt a little sick to her stomach as they went through the motions. For a few months, they’ve been riding this line of perhaps dating, though Raven had purposely never put a label on them. There was no way she could with a guilty conscience. Often looking over his good morning texts. Only truly craving him those times she felt lonely.

Making it back to her place, she realized it was barely noon and she had nothing else to do for the day but stew. Taking her hoodie off, she closed the blinds and turned on the tv, pretending for just a few hours the outside world didn’t exist.

Some hours passed. Raven couldn’t find anything to truly ensnare her mind with interest, so she found herself constantly looking around, trying not to think. Then it began to creep in. She closed her eyes and saw ones of green. She closed her eyes and smelled fresh tea being made for her in the earliest hours of the day.

It was always the best and worst moments of her day.

Albert Einstein once said that madness was doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a different result. He was probably onto something.

She picked up her cell phone and punched his contact info, not knowing his number by heart. He picked up on the second ring.

_“Rae?”_

“Hey,” said Raven, “I thought you heard me when I said I was definitely seeing you later?” she asked, biting her lip.

There was a moment of (probably stunned) silence, and then-

_“Yeah!”_ said Garfield enthusiastically, _“yeah, what do you want to do? I’m up for anything! Dinner, movie? Or I could just come over? You know I’m a mean tofu chef!”_

“I’m still full from ramen with Kori,” Raven told him, “just come over?”

_“Be there as quick as a hawk can!”_

Raven hung up the phone and tried not to think she was caving in and settling.

~

Garfield had been the best sex partner she’d had so far, at least, though they were on different frequencies much of the time.

She couldn’t really blame Conner. It was both of their first times and they’d been quite drunk. With Jericho, it was just quick. Raven’s bra hadn’t even gotten off. He collapsed panting far before she’d gotten close to an orgasm. Beast Boy was a least attentive and caring during.

The scratches he liked to make put her appetite off and he was far too much into the lip-biting kissing that she wasn’t a fan of, coupled with far too much neck-sucking, but the kisses he traveled over her naked body were nice, and he was very skilled with his tongue. That was the way she’d actually use him to get her off and then she’d return the favor by straddling his lap most of the time. Raven winced as his nails dug into her bottom, squeezing too hard as he finished.

“Oh, fuck,” gasped Gar as Raven rolled off him onto her back. She was panting lightly as well, having down most of the work there.

A finish. But not truly satisfied. Never truly satisfied…

Garfield wrapped an arm around Raven and leaned his head on her shoulder, staring with adoration.

“You’re so great, girl,” he whispered. He closed his eyes sleepily and Raven stared at the ceiling, hoping the night passed quick.

And so the process was repeated.

~

Training the next morning went great.

Donna and Raven effectively put out any other duo. Kori wanted them trained in powerful smaller combinations, so she mixed-and-matched pairs and put them against the ultimate test: an Amazonian and a demon.

The two ladies floated in midair side-by-side as they stared down at their defeated enemies, Superboy and Blue Beetle. Donna still watched Conner with uncomfortable dismay.

“Great work girls,” called Starfire as the defeated boys stood up. Jaime grinned up at them, who returned it. Conner just grimaced and walked the other way.

Raven and Donna landed near where Jaime and Gar now stood, next to the newcomers. Cassandra Sandsmark was a fourteen-year-old new Amazonian warrior and Wallace was a the fourth Flash of the world, just a year older. They both smiled.

“Way to go, mama,” grinned Beast Boy. Raven smiled weakly back, still not used to being called that at all.

“Okay, gang,” Starfire announced, looking more serious, “we do have a mission we need to get to work on. I’m still not planning on bringing Wallace and Cass in on this one, but they’re members of the team and it’s only fair to include them on every mission brief.”

“Hear, hear,” Wallace said. There was some chuckling.

The lights in the training facility went dark and the far wall lit like a giant projector. Raven focused on the first image shown.

Tall, broad-shouldered, and lean, the unknown man whom was the star of the blurry image did wear a fancy dark brown leather jacket and a mask that was a shiny red helmet. It seemed like a costume a kid could pull from a cheap Halloween set up, but everything about this person screamed menacing.

“Whoever he is, he’s the real deal,” Kori told them all, “the crime lords across the entire coast have reportedly changed allegiances to this man. Coast City, National City, Gateway, Santa Marta, and now our own hometown may be effected.”

“How the heck have we _not_ heard of this guy if he’s made this much noise already?” asked Jaime skeptically.

“He’s fast and efficient,” said Star, “two months ago, he came upon the scene when he burned down the mansion of the biggest crime syndicate in Coast City while their boss was still inside. The very next morning, he sunk a ship leaving their docks loaded with the drugs attempting to get smuggled out.”

“Sounds like he’s doing our job for us,” shrugged Conner apathetically. Donna tsked in annoyance.

“We need to take this seriously,” Kori said angrily, “Hal Jordan took some time off from the League to investigate this and came away with nothing. Now he’s on another mission and it’s up to us to stop this person before they gain more power than they already have.”

“Any clue how we get to him?” asked Donna.

“I reached out to Cyborg,” said Kori, “he’s getting connected to every camera around this guy or his operations that they haven’t already destroyed. Cy should be able to let us know something concrete very soon. Me, Raven, Donna, Jaime, Conner, and Gar will go at once to end this as quickly as possible.”

“I’m down for a solo run if the kids wanna stay back,” said Donna shortly. Everyone snorted but Raven, and Conner actually broke out a smile.

Kori smiled as well. “Maybe you’ll get to take point. Until then, Titans, good work.”


	3. Red Hood

It was two days later when they got the call. Raven was halfway through her breakfast when she received a text from Kori and dropped her spoon.

_He’s at our docks! NOW!_

Raven magically transformed into her leotard and cloak, grabbed her communicator, and flew out the door.

She wasn’t sure how someone had set up an operation right at their front door. Titans Tower had a view of the entire docks from their living room for Pete’s Sake!

_“Meet us at top of the old automobile factory,”_ Kori’s voice came through comms as she soared through the air, _“get some quick recon in before we take this guy out.”_

The rest of the team was already there, assembled. Donna was on a knee peering down at the docks, Conner unusually right at her side. Raven landed next to Kori.

“He acts fast,” she said in a low voice, “an hour ago there was nothing. Now there’s over a hundred million of ill-gotten cash being moved out of the area with several dozen men.”

“Easy day at the office,” Raven replied. She pulled her hood up and got ready for a fight.

“I think I can hear him,” whispered Conner, “he’s the only one with a distorted voice. Must be the mask… Oh, _big word user_ , this guy…”

“Can you pin-point him down?” asked Blue Beetle, transforming his right arm into a canon. Beast Boy gave Raven a soft look, to which she almost audibly groaned. This wasn’t the time for that.

“On the furthest side away from us, he-“ Conner stopped, his eyes going wide.

“What is it?” asked Donna, bewildered.

“This dude is literally saying my name,” gasped Conner, looking stunned, “he’s calling us out, knowing I’m listening!”

The team took seconds to get over that.

“Then let’s not disappoint!” roared Jaime, morphing his other arm into a second canon.

“Titans, go!” Starfire shouted, and so they dispersed.

The bad guys must have had communications of their own. Nearly every one of them were ready for the oncoming heroes, who found themselves hastily dodging bullets, though Conner and Raven were in no worry of those.

Raven attacked the front line of thugs firing bullets willy-nilly. Using her dark force to slap several of them aside at once, she was joined by Kori who fired green bolts of her own energy in every direction.

“Beetle, Beast Boy,” Starfire ordered, “get to the other side with Donna. Make sure this guy doesn’t get away.”

“You got it, boss,” said Jaime, blasting away. The Scarab gave him wings and he took off with Beast Boy, who’d transformed into a hawk again. Raven watched them go, already sure of their victory.

“You’ll never beat Hood!” one of the thugs yelled. “The boss is way too much for kids like you.” Kori blasted him before he got out another word.

“Another macho man who will drop like any other chump,” she said with disdain, “save us the speeches. We hear them once a week.”

“Guys, you really shouldn’t be doing this,” advised Conner to a group of men whom were attempting to shoot him down mercilessly. He sighed, never even forced to blink once as a hundred bullets bounced harmlessly off his skin, then crashed to the ground hard enough to drop them all on their backs.

“They never learn,” he said, almost disappointed. Raven and Kori laughed. He began to smile with them, but he shot a look of wide eyes in the direction the others flew off to.

“What’s wrong?” demanded Kori in worry.

“Beetle’s down!” Conner yelled. “And Donna is held up. Let’s go!”

Raven flew with them quickly to where their friends were. Kori broke off to help Donna fight a crowd. But Raven was right next to Conner in the air as they came upon the boss fight scene.

It was a wide clearing between stacked shipping containers. Beetle was down and holding his knee that a bullet had obviously just gone through. Standing defensively in front of him was Beast Boy. Across from Gar was the one they’d come for.

Kori was right. Raven sensed he was the real deal. He was taller than they were and though his body was lean, his muscles filled out even his jacket. The red helmet was not stupid or boyish at all, but clearly an emblem that all should tread lightly when they see it, like an animal that was pointedly colorful in nature for its poison. Raven was involuntarily reminded of Deathstroke.

He ignored Beast Boy and glanced up at the flying duo. Unsure as to why, Raven felt his eyes were more on her than anything, but he addressed Conner.

“I call out the Titans and you sent a skeleton crew as your spear point?” he asked dubiously. His mask caused a disruptor in his voice, just like Conner had said. “Were you afraid to jump in, Super-kiddo?”

“And that’s how you talk yourself into getting broken into little bits,” said Conner, diving down at his enemy.

He’d only been perfectly baited. The man in the red helmet brought something out of his coat that emitted green light and threw it like a shuriken dead at Conner, who couldn’t quite avoid the kryptonite’s light. It affected him to the point where when he dropped onto the enemy’s fist, his jaw was shook and he crumpled to the ground.

“Is there anything sadder than being weak and sure of yourself?” the masked man asked aloud, tilting his head as Conner groaned on the ground. His gaze lifted up to Raven again.

And now mixed with the burning aggression within him was a curiosity. Raven hesitated, confused for a moment, before lighting her hands up.

“If you’re hoping to surrender,” she said coldly, “you missed your chance when you came to Jump City.” To her surprise, the red masked man chuckled. Guns were drawn in each of his hand, powerful looking handhelds.

“Touch her and I’ll kill you!” snarled Beast Boy, crouching down.

“By all means,” the man continued in a bored voice, “have at thee.”

Raven flew in close sensing Beast Boy was getting baited just as Conner did. She formed a protective shield around Gar just as a small sphere-like object dropped the ground from his sleeve and he kicked it, ready to fire his guns whichever way Garfield dodged. His sights immediately went straight up to Raven and fired at will.

Producing a shield to deflect the bullets, Raven know felt the fight was off. These shots were clearly going a half foot right or left of her…

Beast Boy modified his form into many different animals, twisting around the new villain trying to get a good claw or bite in, but the man was very good. Shooting at odd angles very difficult that close and stepping with precision, making calculated moves. Raven was very much reminded of Deathstroke.

Joining the fray up close, Raven focused more on defending Gar’s body that attacking. She sensed he was waiting on one of her black bolts to take advantage of its power, though how he knew that much about her fighting style, Raven had no idea.

And then he got in a good shot. Beast Boy went over his head, morphed into a snake to drop down quickly followed by something heavier right on impact. But the red-masked villain had been expecting that. He aimed off of Gar’s snake body and shot right where the outer limbs of a much larger animal could be, catching Mountain Lion Beast Boy in two of his four legs, yelling in immense pain.

“No!” screamed Raven as Garfield dropped bleeding before their enemy. The red masked man looked up just in time to see Raven’s blast hit him square in the chest and send him flying thirty feet back. He rolled out of it guns up, pointed right at Raven, who similarly had her hands directed dangerously at him, covered in in dark mystical energy. Her hood had fallen down.

“I have a lot of respect for you,” the red masked man said as they stood by in this stand-off that Raven would undoubtedly win, “but it’s hard to take you seriously with a hickey tattooed on your beck.”

“Talk serious,” Raven snapped, “why are you here? What do you want?”

“I’m here to do what your team evidentially can’t,” he said rather easily, “drugs and weapons being taken right out from the docks and the Titans never knew about it? I don’t even get how that’s possible.”

“So you’re taking the weapons to do killings of your own, is that it?” said Raven darkly. “You may play at misunderstood hero, but all I see is an angry little child. But if you want to play with the big kids,” Raven’s eyes began to glow menacingly, “you’ll learn quick we’re not all saints.”

“Oh Raven, you’re one of a kind,” he said smoothly. To her great surprise, he withdrew his guns to the holsters on his hips as he saw Starfire and Donna fly in quickly. Her fellow heroines landed on either side of Raven.

“No!” gasped Starfire in concern. “Beetle, Beast Boy!”

“Seriously?” scowled Donna down at Conner. “Your dad can throw an island and you lose to this guy?”

“They’ll be fine, demoiselle,” assured the red-masked man, tilting his head curiously again.

“And you won’t be,” said Starfire, lighting her hands up just like Raven’s.

“I wouldn’t be too concerned with me,” said the man, backing away slowly, “when you’ve got a few hundred other people to worry about.”

“Your men dropped like daisies,” said Donna coolly.

“Wasn’t talking about them, sweet-cheeks,” the man said. He drew what looked like a small detonator from his jacket and, before Raven could react to slap it from his hand with her energy, he clicked a small red button at the top of it.

They herd it clear as day though it was obviously some ways off. The three girls turned in horror as they witnessed small explosions running up the side of one of the tallest buildings in downtown, easily viewable from the bay.

“That’s Jump City Methodist Hospital,” gasped Donna, in mortified disbelief. Raven whirled around in deadly power at the retreating villain.

_“YOU-“_

“Come for me,” he said loudly as some of his own men approached, “or save all of them. Half of your team is down and you can’t do both. Make a call!”

Starfire looked torn and ready to kill. But she took a step backward as well. “Titans, fly out! Save those people!” Her face became murderously dark at the red-masked man.

“We’ll be seeing you again.”

He laughed hard once. “I’m counting on it. Until then,” he waved and twirled around, not a shred of fear of them in his persona. Raven wanted to blast his back.

“No,” he snarled at his man pointing a rifle at the girls, “we have everything we wanted. Time to go, fool.”

They didn’t get to watch them leave. Having to hurry, Donna and Kori flew off immediately, talking of how best to evacuate the higher levels. Thankfully, Conner was getting up. As Raven was turning, she shot a venomous look at their new dire enemy. Curiously, he looked over his shoulder back as well, almost seemingly making eye contact from under his mask. Then he turned back and picked up the pace, leaving the area quickly.

~

Not all was as it seemed, they quickly learned.

Jump City Methodist remained intact, though every single person in it was currently losing their minds in fear. So much so that Raven found herself outside to try to get away from it all. No one needed any more help than what they normally would have at the hospital that day.

“Fortunate that idiot didn’t know how much power it would have taken to drop a building that size,” breathed Conner that night at Titans Tower as Raven was healing Garfield’s second injured limb. She finished and he lifted himself up from the sofa, gratefully stretching his leg that seemed brand-new.

“What have we got?” Kori asked Jaime, who was inspecting the bomb residue.

“We got played,” Jaime said with certainty, dropping the melted and exploded contents back onto the table.

“Huh?” said Donna.

“Guys, this little part was the only bomb,” explained Jaime, holding up a small piece of a black box, allowing them to examine it. “That’s why all there was were cracks along the building’s side. The structural integrity wasn’t even compromised. The rest of the noise came from these,” he said, gesturing to the rest of the melted substance.

“Enhanced fireworks,” he clarified, seeing their dubious faces, “filled with extra juice and a homemade compound to give a bigger flash and make even louder noise than what they were originally designed for.”

“We got fooled and he got away,” groaned Conner, folding his arms. Raven could feel his disappointment with himself. It was borderline self-disgust. She was about to say something soothing but noticed Donna watching him softly as well, and decided not to intervene.

“I’ll keep in contact with Cy,” said Kori, “see if he can help us trace this guy down again. Figure out just what the hell is going on. Until then… Titans, rest up.”

It was definitely a final dismissal, as Kori turned away from them quickly and walked off. Raven could feel her contemplating things heavily. Before she’d made off herself as well, thinking of her bed and a warm cup of tea, she held back a sigh as at this point it would be almost shameful to avoid Gar’s gaze any longer, who’d been trying to catch her eye the entire time.

She turned to him to see a frown on his face and sadness in his eyes, but a hopeful churning inside his mood.

“Doing anything tonight?” he asked.

~

“I can’t believe I got dropped so easily.”

Garfield was sitting at the edge of her bed as Raven returned to her room with a warm ceramic mug of tea, gazing down at the floor sulkily.

“This guy knew what he was doing,” Raven tried comforting him, “and he knew us. He took out Jaime and Conner too, remember?”

That seemed to make Garfield even more depressed. “I know,” he said bitterly, “the mighty Titans. He ripped us apart with a couple of bullets.”

Raven would have destroyed him, but she decided not to point that out.

“You probably think I’m weak,” Gar said softly to the ground. Raven grimaced and sat next to him.

“Stop beating yourself up,” she said, placing a soothing hand on his shoulder. She had honestly hoped the move to be seen as platonic (thinking of her talk with Kori a couple of days ago) but guessed as they were in her actual bedroom, it was pretty fair of Gar to lean into her. His hand found the one she rested on her thigh and when he turned his face towards hers, their noses were nearly touching.

“Thank you for being so good to me, Rae,” he whispered, his breath touching her face. He leaned in and kissed her. Raven moved her lips with his.

It was quicker than usual. Garfield didn’t take the time to be as attentive as he normally was, just pressing their bodies as close as he could get them as he was unusually on top of her and when he was done, he’d left Raven unfinished. She waited until he was asleep before slipping out of bed and attending to herself in the warm shower. She came out looking at Garfield’s sleeping form sprawled out over her bed and walked on to the living room, opening a bottle up and pouring a small glass of wine before finding something on one of the streaming sites.

Her lips parted when one of the trending shows was a new nature documentary about the Tibetan mountains. She stared in disbelief as the quick promo played.

_“You’ve never had Yak Butter Tea?”_

_“I’ve never_ heard _of Yak Butter Tea,”_ she remembered laughing that morning.

Turning the volume low enough so that it definitely wouldn’t wake Garfield, she drank some of her wine deeply and allowed herself to get lost once again.


	4. Confrontation of the Toughest Kind

Two days later came a mighty surprise. Nightwing had shown up at Titans Tower.

“Raven,” he called over as she entered the training facility. Stunned, she took a moment before she eagerly walked over to where he stood with Gar and Jaime.

“You’re back,” she smiled. He returned it warmly.

“Kori called me,” he said unexpectedly. “It’s… professional. She said it’s looking like you guys might need some help with something.”

“I plan on engaging as soon as we find him,” said Kori, who’d just been watching the back of Nightwing’s head. “When we find the location of the Red Hood, Wallace and Cassandra will stay behind to run regular patrols as we go after him.”

Garfield smiled mischievously. “So I’m guessing we’ll break up into teams of two again? Me and Rae… Donna and Conner… Jaime and his Scarab… You and Sir Richard “Nightwing” Grayson.”

“Garfield,” snapped Raven, using some energy to knock him upside the head as Nightwing rubbed the back of his neck and Kori looked flustered.

~

How a single day can radically change everything…

Raven awoke with dawn just beginning to rise same as usual a week later. Garfield had sent her a text after her shower, but she just wasn’t in the mood to reply. They’d see each other at training anyways.

Showing up, it was almost gratifying to see Starfire and Nightwing talking one-on-one so close together. She lingered back to give them some more time as no one else had got there yet. Kori pulled some hair behind her ear.

Training was normal as well. The team fought well. Nightwing synced with Starfire as faultless as ever. They even shared a smile as they handily beat Garfield and Jaime in two-vs-two.

Then Starfire’s communicator rang from her wrist and everything changed.

Starfire listened in for a moment then her eyes popped wide. She raised a hand high to halt practice.

“Cyborg has got something!” she announced loudly to them all, adrenaline coursing through her in preparation for action. Unknowing of what was to come in the next minutes.

Beetle dimmed the lights of the training facility and the far wall became a projector again, showing them Cyborg’s serious face. Despite the weight of the situation, Raven smiled. Cy was one of her oldest friends as well, having been the oldest member on the team when she originally joined. But he’d moved on to the Justice League just two years after that.

“Titans,” he said, grimness radiating from his every cell and circuit.

“What have you got, Cy?” asked Kori intently. “Do we have his location?”

Cyborg’s eyes were intensely on Nightwing, who began to feel confusion. He flicked them over to Kori and said, “Yeah, we got him. I grabbed a couple of images off a security feed that his goons forgot to disassemble.”

“Finally,” rumbled Conner, placing his hands on his hips, “let’s go get this fucker.”

Curiously, he was standing next to Donna again.

Cyborg’s eyes went somberly back to Nightwing, even flashing to Raven standing just behind him for a moment.

“Showing images now,” he sighed, shutting his human eye tightly. His image disappeared followed by a screen shot of a black car pulling up outside of a snazzy private club with a waiter standing outside. The shot was followed by Red Hood stepping out of the vehicle sans goons, donning the same attire they’d fought him that day in. The next image was of him even closer to the front door, shaking hands with the apparent waiter. The second to last was Red Hood reaching behind his head, readying to pull his crimson helmet off.

Then the final image appeared.

Raven paled. Her eyes went wide and her lower jaw dropped, like most of the Titans. Their silence was deafening to Raven’s empathy.

Under the Red Hood was a young man about most of their age with olive skin, cropped black hair that was a signature of only one other man alive, and very intense emerald green eyes.

“That’s… not… possible…” said Conner in a hushed tone. Donna next to him stared as wordless and as open-mouthed as the rest of them. In horror at what couldn’t be true.

“It can’t be him,” reasoned Starfire in a maniacal voice, “it’s a trick.” The image didn’t leave, but Cyborg’s voice came on like a narrator.

“It’s him, Kori,” said Cy sadly, “facial recognitions match. We caught an audio clip from the security feed… it’s a match. It’s him. The Red Hood… is Damian Wayne.”

Raven stared at Damian’s face. Though he was older, he looked just as she had seen him that morning. The same chiseled jawline. The same arch to his brow. The same way Damian set his mouth.

She felt as though a hole the size of the tower had just been blown through her gut. She didn’t know how she was still standing. The image disappeared, replaced by Cyborg’s somber image.

“This security feed is still up,” he said in a very tired voice, “so we know he’s still staying in a hotel down the road from this joint in Coast City under the pseudonym ‘Jason Todd’. Top floor, penthouse. We… we need to strike before he moves again.” He lifted his eyes to his old team’s face and Raven didn’t need to be next to him to feel the remorse.

“I can suit up some members of the League, guys… Flash might be available and nothing can stand up to him… you all don’t have to do this…”

“No,” choked Kori. Her voice was shaking just as her eyes were, but her form was steady. “No, it has to be us. It needs to be us. We need answers.” Her eyes flickered to her ex-boyfriend. Nightwing was staring at the ground.

Cyborg was watching him as well. He sighed. “I need to know man… who should tell the big guy.”

Nightwing’s head snapped, still looking away from them all. Raven felt his unwillingness to accept the situation.

“I’ll do it,” Raven volunteered loudly. They turned to look to her. “Other than Dick, I know Batman better than anyone else here. I’ll tell him, but only after we see him. I have to know…” she trailed off, leaving the rest of it unsaid. She wasn’t sure what force was keeping her going. It felt like her entire world collapsed and she was left staring at the rubble. Raven stared at the screen waiting for Cyborg to accept her resolve, not even remotely caring that Garfield was watching her now.

“I’ll go with you, Rae,” Nightwing began shaking his head. Raven felt his resolve match her own. “Of course I will. But you’re right. Only _after_ we get ahold of Damian. We’re taking him to see his father _tonight_.”

“Are you sure you’re-“ Kori began, but immediately cut off at the look on Nightwing’s face. She turned to the team, unsure of what to say, except-

“Suit up.”

~

Raven ignored the mutterings of the team as they readied themselves for what was about to happen. She stared away from Beast Boy’s attempts to catch her eye. Savage thoughts festered in her head against Raven’s will.

Damian was alive, she’d thought. What did he think was going to happen?

“Everyone good to go yet?” demanded Nightwing. The Titans meekly responded. Kori placed a soft hand on his shoulder, trying to convey a reminder to Dick that this was hard for them as well. She looked gravely to the rest of the team and then to Raven, whom nodded, raised a hand, and created a portal.

~

Coast City was beautiful this time of year, if they had cared enough to enjoy it. Raven teleported them straight to the hotel they needed to go to, one of the many luxurious ones in Queen Industries line, and her eyes soared the outside windows straight to the top.

He was here… he was right here…

“Titans, infiltrate fast,” Starfire ordered, as they already drew enough attention to themselves. Everyone was turning their heads from the streets and was no different as they entered the hotel like a hyper-powered SWAT team. Raven clamped her dark energy around the mouths of many people to get them from making too much noise as Nightwing approached the reception with a vicious look upon his face.

“You’re harboring a deadly criminal,” he told the elder man aggressively, “which penthouse suite is booked for Jason Todd? _Now!”_

Trembling, the man answered, “Floor 57, the entire area is our exclusive _Billionaire_ suite.”

Nightwing tsked as he turned away from the man. Raven matched his intensity as they lead the way up, several feet ahead of even Starfire.

He had to have still been here. Please don’t let him have gotten away…

They got to the right door and she blew it open, uncaring. The moment had come.

The Titans filed into a large, lavish living area. It was like an actual billionaire’s in-town residence for when they were too tired to get driven out to their country estate away from the city noise. Beetle and Kori had their blasters ready every which way ready to fire at goons hung around, but none came. But now Raven’s breathing became shaky as she stared at a certain door. She could feel curiosity from just behind it. Garfield was watching her steadily now.

The door opened and Raven’s mouth along with it. It was him. Dressed in sweatpants and no shirt, leaving his ripped torso exposed as if he’d just woke up and rolled out of bed, Damian was almost exactly as she remembered. There was a long second where nothing was said that she took to just enjoy it.

Easy breathing came to her. He was maybe half a foot taller and more muscular, but he still had that lean, athletic figure. His left eyebrow cocked up. There was a faint pale scar trailing from the corner of his fight brow that dashed across his temple to his hairline…

“Damian,” breathed Nightwing at last.

There was no hostility in the room, but Damian was still ready for it, Raven felt. She couldn’t believe it was him she had blasted in the chest just over a week ago. She’d sooner harm herself.

“Grayson,” Damian greeted with cool indifference, as if not a day had passed. His eyes lifted above their heads in thought. “Those buffoons must have missed a camera. The one job they had…”

“You couldn’t have hid from us or the League forever doing the things you’ve done, Damian,” said Starfire softly. Everything in her wanted Damian to come peacefully, maybe repent and earn forgiveness. To be a part of things again.

“If I was hiding, do you think I’d hold up in one of the most enviable locations in the city, Koriand’r,” said Damian in a bored voice. Emerald eyes drifted over the face of his old friends. Though when they came upon Raven, they’d dropped, as if he didn’t wish to look her in the face.

For the first time in a few hours, she felt anger rather than intensity and relief.

“What do you all want?” he asked dully. “To thank me for doing your job for you? Jump City is nearly completely drug clear. You’re welcome.”

“Dude,” said Jaime in disbelief.

Damian glared at Nightwing. It was almost as if they were having a silent conversation. Raven wanted him to look at her. Meet her in the eyes.

“Leave,” said Damian in a hard voice. Raven sympathized with Dick’s anger.

“We’re not-“ began Dick angrily.

“I wasn’t talking to you,” cut across Damian in a hiss, though his eyes were still definitely on Nightwing. Behind him, the door creaked open again. A blonde bimbo wearing an unbuttoned white dress shirt and small underwear appeared looking frilly, but sketchy on the situation going on around her. She tip-toed past Damian as if she was sneaking out.

Raven stared at the beautiful girl coming out of the bedroom Damian was just in.

It doesn’t matter, she told herself. He was alive. That’s all that matters.

Donna looked deeply unimpressed as the girl bent to grab what must’ve been her skirt from the floor and gave everyone a cheeky show. She straightened back up, luxurious blond hair tossing around, giggled as if they were all having a goofy time, and looked back at Damian before she put her bottoms on.

“Call me?” she asked. Damian’s hard glare never wavered from his brother.

“No,” he answered. The blonde looked wilted, as if she had just realized this wasn’t an after party.

“Where were you?” demanded Nightwing vehemently, not bothering with the sideshow. “Why didn’t you come home?!”

Damian finally dropped his eyes to the floor, nodding to himself. When the emeralds came back up to the team again, they were dangerous.

“That’s the problem with your lack of understanding,” he said coldly, his body twisting the slightest degree, “you’re acting under the presumption,” his hand slowly moved behind his back, “that I don’t remember _everything.”_

In the blink of an eye, Damian withdrew one of the powerful handhelds he’d used as Red Hood. Raven was putting up protection for their teammates weak to gunfire, but he aimed it at the blonde pulling her skirt up and shot.

Raven watched her eyes go wide as the bullet connected with her spine. She’d need immediate medical attention or she’d certainly die. Raven whirled her head back to Damian to see him already gone.

“No, he doesn’t-“ started Conner, but Donna wrapped her arms around him quickly.

“I can see a green glow in there! He has kryptonite!”

“Raven, help the girl!” Starfire roared. She followed Beetle and Nightwing already giving chase as Conner shouted his helplessness. Raven, half wanting to leave the damn girl be, dropped to her knees and began healing. She willed for her body to push the bullet out and concentrated on her bones to start healing. Perhaps the girl wouldn’t be paralyzed.

“I’m going after them,” said Donna. She shot off like a missile and Conner vented aggressively. Beast Boy laid a hand on Raven’s shoulder, but she didn’t look up at him. She just didn’t care in the moment. Her amethyst eyes staid on the girl, who now had a tear forming.

“Jason,” she mumbled weakly, “why… why did he…”

Raven felt sympathy for her for the first time as she feinted.

“I don’t know,” she muttered back.

~

The Titans had been unable to capture Damian yet again, who’d had a getaway jet getting into position ever since he heard the Titans barging in. He broke out the window and landed on it. Starfire and Donna, the only ones quick enough to catch him at that point, were helpless as he shot down some of the suspension cables holding up a bridge over Coast City. They’d been forced to actually save many lives this time, abandoning the chase.

Nightwing, like Raven, was inconsolable, though he was must louder about it than she was. It was all Kori could do to get him to calm down. He wasn’t angry at the team. Just himself.

“We should have been more prepared,” he was saying, his clenched fists shaking, “should have planned for an escape route.”

“We _will_ get him, Dick,” soothed Kori, looking surprised as Nightwing leaned his head into her shoulder. She looked surprised at first, but then gladly placed a hand tenderly on the back of his head and rested their temples together.

Garfield was trying to do the same for Raven, but she wasn’t having it. She kept her arms folded and stared crossly out the glass that overlooked Jump City.

He was out there. He was hiding from her, she was sure of it…

“Rae?”

She didn’t turn towards Beast Boy’s voice, not wanting to bother with his comforting solutions. Damian was out there and he was willingly alone. Raven had to find out why. She turned the opposite way from Beast Boy and addressed Dick.

“We need to go,” she told him. Kori looked a beat upset about breaking up their moment, but let it go. Nightwing looked at Raven and nodded grimly. It was time to tell his father. She joined him in the middle of the room, away from everyone else surrounding them. Their somber looks told the sad, long tale of the day. But Raven, despite shaking with how impacted she was, raised a hand and created a glowing circular portal from nothing.


	5. Be Still My Beating Heart

She’d visited Wayne Manor more than she’d like to admit, if she ever admitted why she so often visited.

Though it was a glorious sight to behold in the setting sun like this, they didn’t get the chance to admire it as Raven teleported them to the foyer inside, making Alfred Pennyworth jump.

“Goodness gracious,” said Alfred as the light behind them dissipated, “Lady Raven, Master Dick, what may we owe the pleasure of this late visit?”

Dick looked like the words died in his mouth. Raven guessed he hadn’t even thought of having to explain it to the family’s grandfather yet.

“We’re here to see the big guy,” said Raven for him, “is he here Alfred? Or pretending he can still jump across rooftops in his old age?” she teased, trying for a smile.

Alfred studied them scrupulously in that old English refined manner he did. He was too long in the game to be tricked by a heavy situation belied behind light-hearted messages.

“He’s in his private study,” he told them however, “I believe he’s still resting. Batman fought Black Mask’s gang and won this afternoon.”

“Is he alright?” asked Raven in genuine concern. She’d healed Bruce plenty these past few years, though he never once admitted he had needed it.

“It really is just some minor scratches, Lady Raven,” smiled Alfred warmly. His hands were folded gentlemanly behind his back and it reminded her of a certain someone. “I believe Master Bruce would be glad to accept company this evening- I’m sure he’s bored senseless just waiting around.”

“Thanks, Al,” Raven smiled. It felt painful to do so.

“I’ll probably be staying the night,” said Dick, turning, “see you in the morning, Al.”

“Shall I prepare your usual room, Lady Raven?” called Alfred as they started walking away. She looked back at him.

“Not this time, thank you, Alfred,” she said back, “I need to report to the team as soon as I can.” Her and Richard carried on without another word. The sun was very nearly fully set outside and the manor was changing tones with it, from something elegant and grandiose to a sort of castle that held sinister secrets in its long hallway shadows. They duo came upon the double oak doors of the master study and knocked.

Creaking open, they met Bruce Wayne’s curious face. His royal blue eyes darted between his eldest son and Raven.

“This is a surprise,” he said, further opening up and allowing them in.

Bruce Wayne’s master study was a dream of Raven’s. Books lined neatly in rows on floor-to-ceiling shelves and a number of odd objects placed on his desks, Bruce led them past it all to the great fireplace down at the end, which was lit, where four red cushy armchairs sat facing each other. Bruce sat down at one in particular and Raven and Dick sat at the two facing him. There was a bottle of an open Chateau and a wine glass on a small table next to him. Bruce saw Raven eye it.

“It’s aired out nicely,” Bruce commented, “shall I pour you out a glass? 1994 was a great year for this particular vineyard.”

“You’ve already deduced we’re not here for pleasantry,” frowned Dick. A very tired look entered Bruce’s eyes.

“Let’s hear the worst of it then,” he said, picking up his wine glass and swirling it.

Dick swallowed and let go of a large breath, not sure of where to start, Raven felt. So she picked up in his stead.

“You obviously know of the Red Hood that’s been terrorizing the West Coast,” she said. Her eyes met with his. “We’ve had Cyborg watch every move we could of his, following him before he accumulated too much damage. Well, we finally cornered him…”

“Bruce, it’s Damian,” said Dick blatantly. Raven gave him wild eyes at his rip-off-the-band-aid method. Perhaps that’s how Bruce would be able to best absorb the impact. “Damian is the guy under the Red Hood. He’s still alive! He hasn’t been dead this entire time, just missing. He seemed to feel like- like he’s been wronged somehow.”

Bruce studied them both. Raven didn’t feel nearly as much as she thought she would from him. She still felt hollow from the day herself. Instead of waiting for the emotional reaction she thought would transpire, Raven began studying him right back.

“Damian is back?” he asked, and his words sounded only a little heavier. “He’s been the one causing this from underneath a Red Hood?’

“Well, we can stop him there,” said Dick, his eyes tightening uncertainly at his father, “we should have had him today. Next time we’ll… but Bruce, Damian is back. He’s alive!”

Bruce Wayne studied his wine. His eyes were controlled. His muscles were controlled, free of spasm. His jaw wasn’t even working at the riveting news.

Raven felt the second blow of the day as she understood. It clicked in Dick’s mind a second after.

“ _You knew,”_ he whispered in a hushed, unbelieving tone, “you fucking knew Damian was alive.”

Bruce had the dignity to look up and meet them both in the eye. Raven recalled all the times she visited Wayne Manor to stare at that empty grave. All the times Bruce had been right there with her, putting an arm around her shoulder, offering her to come inside for a drink, even though she wasn’t of legal age. They hadn’t cared. They’d mourned Damian deeply together over and over and over again. Raven had a room here reserved for her constant stays.

“How?” she croaked. “Why? How could you?!”

Now she felt his remorse as Bruce gazed at the two younger people, but it felt far too late for that. He sighed deeply and dropped his enchantingly deep blue eyes back to his wine.

“Two days before the funeral, I found where Damian’s body had gone,” he said then in a hollow voice, “let me explain…”

**_Three Years Ago…_ **

****

The fortress was nigh-impenetrable. Armed to the teeth with some of the most skilled hand-to-hand fighters in the world wielding the finest made blades and a mystical protection of the mountain, Nanda Parbat was a place any member of the League would tread lightly.

But Batman was filled with a rage that he was scared wouldn’t quell.

Arms shattered, ribs broke, and skulls were fractured as he made his way up the castle-like estate. Any member of the shadow whom stepped forward were broken viciously by the Bat. He made his way through the palace like a monster on a seek-and-destroy mission. The only one whom truly concerned him was Shiva, knowing he’d have to resort to lethal tactics from the arsenal on his belt to subdue her.

But he needn’t had worried. Shiva had knelt on his arrival, and continued to do so as he walked past. The one whom Ra’s Al Ghul had chosen to take his stead. Shiva held back her blade out of honor for her old master’s wishes.

So Batman had reached the cavern with the glowing green liquid just in time. The barrel of a powerful handheld was aimed right at his head by the most beautiful woman he’d ever seen.

“Take another step and only one of us will walk away from this place,” snarled Talia Al Ghul. Behind her, Batman saw a raised platform holding a body wrapped in Tibetan silk. Just long enough to be…

“You can’t do this,” Batman told Talia, trying to make her see reason, “our son deserves a proper burial. Honor him!”

“What would you truly know of honor?” demanded Talia. Her emerald eyes were burning.

“You don’t know what he’ll come out as!” Batman yelled. His foot inched forward and Talia cocked her weapon. Batman stilled.

“Would you kill me?” he said softly. But his mind was analyzing everything. Which moves to make at the exact time they needed to be made to get around her should he must.

Talia’s eyes were shaking.

“Do you remember the day I brought him to you?” she asked, and there was a tremor in her voice. “After Slade attacked our home, betrayed my family. He was a warrior, but still just a ten-year-old boy. I brought him to you because I thought the safest place on the planet was wherever _you_ just happened to be. I thought the best place in this world for him at that moment was with his _father,_ who could protect him _._ ”

She let that sting for a moment before adding, in a harsh voice, “That decision has cost me _everything._ ”

“Do you know how I found our son? His broken body was floating in the middle of the ocean, blue from hours drifting in freezing water. Not a hand from a friend or father to help him in death. Yet the sharks themselves swam away from his corpse in respect of what the world had lost. And now you come here expecting me to give him back to your incapable hands? Oh, my love, yes… yes, I would kill you where you stand. _Without hesitation!”_

And the pain had been complete. A tear had fallen from the Batman’s face at last as he witnessed the woman whom he had loved defend their dead child… from him. Batman turned and walked away from it all.

**_Present Day…_ **

****

“And that’s what happened,” finished Bruce, his eyes sadly on the fire. His breathing was slow and sad, just like his mind at that moment. “Other than keeping tabs on her son, the League of Shadows had been watching over Brother Blood’s actions for months. Where he was drilling into the ocean’s depths, he’d been hoping to find a Lazarus Pit of his own. He thought it would enhance his physical form. When the Titans engaged that night, Talia had been informed by her scouts, but by the time she’d arrived… the deed was done.”

Raven and Dick had listened in steely silence. Almost speechless. Now it clicked again how Bruce had been able to stand out there with Raven all those times watching over his empty grave. The Batman was broken…

“Do you know how he came back?” asked Dick, his strained hands intertwined.

“Not well,” said Bruce sadly, “but he slowly regained his sense of self. Though, as you see, his morality rate dropped.”

“And that’s why no one’s heard from Brother Blood for years now?” demanded Dick, just trying to understand the whole picture that they were never shown, “Damian came back and went after him like a sicko?”

“No,” answered Bruce gravely, “that was Talia. After Damian didn’t need her constant tending to, she went after Blood and caught up with him less than four months after the incident. She killed his men and ripped Blood to pieces… I understand she has his skull on display in Nanda Parbat.”

“Wow,” breathed Raven. She felt at a loss of… everything still.

Bruce eyes went back and forth between the two.

“Raven… Dick…”

“I don’t hate you for this, Bruce,” said Dick through gritted teeth and closed eyes, “but God damnit if you don’t have royal fuck up after royal fuck up…”

Bruce’s royal blue eyes sadly found Raven. Wordless still, she closed her eyes and gave a noncommittal shrug-and-nod of the head. It was the best he’d get from her for now.

Dick was staying the night, deciding to have some wine and long talks with his father, but Raven still chose to go despite Bruce’s insistence.

She would definitely not be reporting to anyone how it went this night. Maybe Dick would fill Kori in when morning came. Opening a portal, Raven went home.

Her apartment was dark, the only light coming in from the open blinds. But as he view faced away from the city lights and instead to the open bay, it wasn’t much. She checked her phone for the first time in hours. Garfield had called a few times. Donna had sent a text asking if everything was okay.

It was not.

She removed her heels and was about to change when she walked through her living room and stilled- sensing that she was not alone.

“There’s no one who can sneak up on me,” she warned the intruder, glancing left and right into the dark.

_“Oh Raven, you’re one of a kind.”_

Her heart stilled. Turning slowly, she saw him there as still as a statue, leaning against her wall in a cool manner with his arms folded. Leather jacket and Red Hood on. They stared at one another.

“Take that ridiculous thing off,” she whispered. Red Hood didn’t move for a moment and Raven thought he wasn’t going to oblige. Then he came off her wall and reached behind his head.

Despite everything of the day, Raven had an emotional, audible gasp when Damian’s face was revealed. His green eyes met hers as he sat the mask on his dinner table.

“Thought we could chat,” he said simply. He leaned back on her table and folded his arms again, his emeralds staring at Raven intently.

She took in every detail of him. It was as if only a very long day had passed since the last time they were face to face like this. Raven got the feeling he was doing the same. His eyes had miniscule movements and Raven knew he was her lips, her tone, her hair. She saw them flash to her neck where there’d been a hickey last week. Then Raven realized something that sparked some anger.

“So you even kept up with me,” she accused, clenching a fist. How long had he decided to just _not_ to talk to her?

Damian’s eyebrow raised slowly. “Would you not have kept up with me?”

“I would have talked to you!” she shouted, throwing her head forward. “I would have done anything!”

“So you say,” said Damian bitterly and Raven backtracked her anger for a moment, remembering he was the one disappointed in them. In her.

“Why didn’t you come back?” she asked in a calmer voice. “I was just at Wayne Manor with Dick. Your father, he told us everything. How he found you before your mother dipped you in the Lazarus Pit…” her eyes grazed the scar on the top right side of her head. “Why didn’t you come back…”

Damian’s jaw worked as they studied one another. Raven felt a burning desire in him to tell her everything, but then another part of him that just wanted to take off and not bother with it ever again. Finally, his eyes casted themselves down and away as he started to talk.

“I wasn’t dead you know,” he began, “that night. Not at first, anyway. I thought you clearly would have known that. Blood got a good shot in, but he still missed. The bullet grazed right here, obviously,” he explained, propping his right eyebrow up to highlight the scar, “and caused a lot of blood loss, but I wasn’t dead. Stunned, probably. I think my body went into a state of shock, because I remember I couldn’t _feel_ anything. I fell out of the jet, but had enough sense to…” he stopped, mashing his mouth in a hard line. Raven hated the pain in his emerald eyes.

“I knew you weren’t dead,” said Raven breathlessly, “I knew it. Though everything screamed he’d just killed you, I felt you were still alive. But how? You fell out the jet… we were almost three hundred feet up…”

Damian’s eyes shut tightly. Raven knew they were upon the hard part. The moment of betrayal, to Damian.

“I grabbed ahold of the rope Jaime had thrown out to us,” he said in a hard whisper and Raven paled, “it was sticking out of the hangar door and I had enough sense to grab on to keep from falling.” His eyes opened and Raven felt broken at the horrible reminiscent gleam in them.

“I held on… for as long as I could, Raven. Every second thinking, they’ll come. They’ll try to save me. They’ll turn the plane around and get me. After all, all they had to do was open the hangar door and see…” his eyes became hollow, “I guess you guys couldn’t hear the screams over the jet engines. I kept it up for as long as I could and then… I couldn’t hold on anymore.”

Raven had tears in her eyes.

“We did go back,” she said, her voice trembling, “we looked everywhere for you. But that’s why we couldn’t find you. We just thought you were dead, Damian. And Conner was out and Starfire was shot. We just didn’t want any more people to die. Please…”

Damian nodded as though he’d gone over this answer in his head and numbly accepted it. “I know…” was all he said. He stood up and Raven watched him with wide, wet eyes.

“I should go,” he said urgently, his eyes closed again, but that was out of the question to Raven. She stepped forward quickly and grabbed his hand before he even fully turned.

“No,” she said, trying to get him to look at her. Damian didn’t fight her grasp, but gazed over the top of her head. They’d been an inch within each other’s height back then. Now she barely reached his chin.

“You have your own life to live, Raven,” said Damian in an automatic sort of voice, “and so do I.”

“You’re here,” Raven told him, “and you’re staying.”

“I’m not a Titan anymore. You all made sure of that.”

Raven swallowed the hurt of that statement. “And you don’t have to be,” she said softly, knowing she was far too close to him, “but you’re not getting away from me that easily.”

She knew she shouldn’t have done it. But honestly, the reasons for that were miles away from her thoughts. Damian’s eyes as they came down to meet hers overwhelmed Raven.

Watching her own pale fingers gently lay across his jawline, Raven felt Damian’s hand find the small of her back as she raised herself up and he came down. Their lips met and it was better than Raven had ever once imagined in all those years.

Her breathing was shaky as they continued. His jacket became unzipped and disposed of on her living room floor. She guided him back to the bedroom, kissing all the while. Grabbing his shoulders, Raven pushed Damian down to sit him on the edge of her bed, pulling his shirt up and over. Emerald eyes popped as she dispelled the leotard and cloak, leaving her in front of him in only small black underwear. She eagerly climbed on top of his lap and delivered another deep kiss, savoring every moment of this.

All else outside the two of them was ignored eternally. The phone on her nightstand buzzing with Garfield’s concerned calls. The Red Hood helmet on her dinner table. Raven’s only thought was pulling Damian closer, touching every inch of him as they laid under her bedsheets. Gasping his name as he thrusted. Seeing fireworks as he finished her the first time. Hearing the sound of them and becoming intoxicated when his tongue entered her mouth. He was on top of her and she was on top of him, probably going many more rounds than they should have after a long day. But every time Damian’s mouth found her skin after they’d finish together she’d whisper, “Please don’t stop.”

And their bodies would melt together again.

~

Six missed calls. Two texts.

_I know you’re hurting, Rae. But please let me know you’re alright._ – Garfield.

_How did the talk with Batman go? Did he handle it? Kori hasn’t heard anything from Dick either and she’s freaking out. Please let me know something. : (_ \- Garfield.

Raven was as sore as could be as she awoke the next morning and rolled out of bed, not even checking her phone after hearing the sounds emitting from her kitchen. Stiffly, she pulled a long tee-shirt on so she wouldn’t be walking around entirely naked and got up.

Damian was there, shirtless but in his pants from the prior night, making some tea. A few scars riddled his ripped, mean-looking back. He glanced back at her with a cocked eyebrow and an amused expression that made her heart flutter.

“Yak Butter Tea?” he asked in a humorous voice. Raven went slightly pink.

“I ordered some after watching a documentary last week,” she mumbled and wrapped her arms around his back at the waist. It was an image straight from her memories. And dreams.

“You know you have nothing in your fridge to eat, right?” said Damian in a very audible low voice.

“I usually pick something up on the way back from training,” said Raven, becoming distracted as Damian’s free hand caressed hers, “all I really keep here is some tea and chocolate.”

“And very, very expensive wine,” mused Damian. Raven ignored that, kissing his back. Backing off, she heaved herself up so that she seated on the kitchen island, watching Damian turn around curiously. His eyes flashed down, parting his mouth, when he saw her opening her legs, the shirt she wore lifting up just enough. Without even turning his head around, he moved the kettle to a nonactive burner and came forward for her. Insatiable, her hands went instinctively for his pants which slid down with ease. Her legs wrapped around his waist as he entered her and she gasped, then folding her arms around his neck.

He went deep. And seemed to know just how to find the g-spot. Raven’s eyes rolled upwards as she experienced the best morning sex she’d ever had. Seduced further by Damian’s euphoria. Him loving every inch of her as much she loved and craved every inch of him.

The life they could have had…

Raven’s toes curled as she flexed and came for him, Damian holding her thighs and moaning in her mouth as he did the same. She felt him shoot. Their lips parted but foreheads retained connection as jeweled eyes gazed into one another.

“Have anything to do today?” wondered Raven breathlessly, thinking of his company in a hot shower. Damian huffed a low chuckle.

“No,” he answered, “but I can’t stick around here. Your team is still after me.”

Raven was too elated to grimace, wincing only because he pulled away. She watched him watch her as he lifted his pants back up and began redoing them. Emerald eyes hungrily went up and down her form.

“I know somewhere we could go,” he offered, “if you’d like to join me.”

Raven should have thought it over. But it wasn’t a debate in her mind.

“Where are we headed?” she asked. “After tea.”

Damian’s jaw worked as he tried to fight it. But after a moment a crooked smirk made its way to his face.


	6. Lost Time

Coast City was indeed beautiful this time of the year, Raven realized, now that she had the time to enjoy it.

“You know the team probably expects you to return to the scene of the crime?” said Raven.

She was wearing a matching set of jet-black track pants and a pullover with the hood up, staring down the street that the hotel Damian ‘Jason Todd’ Wayne had been staying in up until yesterday was. Glancing up from the competing hotel they were about to enter, Raven saw the spot Damian must have broken through the windows on the very top floor boarded off.

“Wonder how much that’s going to cost them,” she muttered.

“Whatever it is, they can afford it,” said Damian. He was looking skywards at it with her, holding her hand. That crooked smirk came back as they looked at each other again. “Come on.”

The lobby was a wide area with a line of chic chandeliers Raven found appealing hanging from a forty-foot ceiling. Some bust boys were scurrying around and one of the three older businessmen sitting around on the guest sofas caught Raven’s eye and winked. Feeling bile in her mouth, they came upon the reception desk where a very pretty brunette maybe a few years older than them was waiting in an elegant all-black suit. Her eyes sparkled when she saw Damian approaching but quickly adopted a bitter ice tone when she noticed Raven walking side-by-side with him, holding hands.

“Mister Timothy,” the receptionist said with forced pleasantry and a fixed smile. Raven had to resist the urge to cock an eyebrow. “Will you be staying with us again?” Her eyes unwillingly flitted to their hand holding again.

“Same room, if it’s available, Grace,” said ‘Timothy’ with a smirk. Raven squeezed his hand.

“Of course,” said Grace with a toothy ear-to-ear smile that just looked painful. She typed something into a computer behind the counter, maintaining that grin all the while, and briskly held out a platinum card which Damian took from her.

“I still have your information from _last time_ ,” Grace informed him, somehow talking while keeping all those pearly whites still in view, “just feel free to pay as you check out.” Raven was certain she was going to find a way to voodoo the pair of them the moment they left.

When they were tucked away inside of the elevator going straight up to the sixty-first floor, Raven rounded on Damian crossly.

“ _Timothy_?” she asked with some annoyance. Damian had the grace to at least look somewhat ashamed.

“Tim Drake is my secondary alias,” he told her, “it would be on the very foolish side to continue sliding my cards under the name ‘Jason Todd’…”

It should have annoyed her more than it did, but Raven let it roll off her shoulders with ease. Then the next obvious thing came up.

“Sooo,” she began skeptically, this time avoiding Damian’s gaze and folding her arms, “you and _Grace,_ huh?”

Damian merely sighed deeply then remained in what he apparently thought was a dignified silence.

It was like a grander version of her apartment. Wide windows in a living area gave them a nearly 180 degree viewing angles of Coast City’s beaches.

But Raven only had eyes for Damian, dropping his bags, watching her just as intensely.

“How long can you stay?” he asked, his emeralds smoldering.

“A couple of days,” she swallowed, already thinking of her plan, “but I’ll be back after.”

“We’ll have to actually talk at some point you know,” she continued as he walked closer to her, “it can’t wait forever.”

“I know,” he agreed softly, “but it can wait awhile longer.”

And if Grace had been jealous of their hand holding, she would have been absolutely decimated by the heat of which he kissed her.

~

“I never hurt much of anybody.”

Raven lifted her head from his chest and eyed Damian skeptically. He met her gaze and eye rolled.

“Alright, fine, a few bad guys here or there.”

“You set a mansion on fire with a mob boss still inside,” said Raven blandly. Damian’s mouth twisted.

“Those are the ones who have to get snuffed out,” he said coolly. “There will always be more lower guys. Sheep, dispersing into thin numbers if you scratch the shepherd. That’s how you stop large operations.”

“If you had everything you needed, why not just turn them in, Damian? Lock them up and throw away the key.”

Raven felt Damian’s irritation and saw it in his deepening frown.

“Because those kind of guys will always pay someone on the outside to form a new key and open the cell doors again,” he spat, “that’s why Gotham has remained the way it is. I swear my father has been busting the same heads for twenty years now…”

“Your father is a good man,” Raven told him gently. She felt Damian want to argue with that fact… but found he couldn’t. He softened and Raven rested her cheek on his chest again, still looking up at him.

“How has he been?” Damian asked, looking away, though his arm came around Raven’s shoulders to hold her. “I haven’t been able to keep up with him much. Or anyone else for that matter, except public knowledge.”

“He wasn’t… alright for a long while. But people helped him through it. He and Dick and Alfred all leaned on each other a lot.”

Damian grimaced. “Story of his life, I suppose.”

“I’ve actually had a lot of long late night talks with your dad,” said Raven, “though I’m not his biggest fan at the moment…” she trailed off bitterly.

Damian huffed a laugh. “I never would have predicted that one.”

Raven smiled up at him. “Does it upset you he found another bird to go patrolling with?” she asked, to which Damian responded with an incredulous stare.

“You went patrolling with Batman?”

“I spent many night’s in Gotham. A lot of Gotham’s underbelly was surprised when the Batman showed up with a magical partner for once.”

“Well, I’ll be,” mused Damian, staring up at the ceiling thoughtfully. His eyes came back to Raven’s after a moment.

“Grayson?”

Now it was Raven’s turn to grimace. “Dick probably took it even worse. He began staying in Gotham a lot afterwards, sticking to the Bat-family rather than the Titans. Pretty much living there. Drinking a lot, but he’s sobered up quite a bit from what I can tell. But he and Kori eventually broke it off. She was so heart-broken… and then he started dating Barbara.” Damian rolled his eyes skyward.

“That girl was never quite right for him,” muttered Damian. “Just because you grew up with somebody doesn’t mean anything. It’s a connection of home- familiarity. Not of what you can be.”

“Well, they didn’t last long,” Raven carried on, “not even a year later and he was avoiding her at all costs.”

They shared a small chuckle of amusement at their friend’s expense. Then Damian’s eyes found the ceiling again and Raven felt him reluctantly approach something.

“And… you and Garfield?” he asked, closing his green eyes. Raven stared at him.

“We aren’t actually together,” she told him, trying to will eye contact, but all he did was snort. “I’m serious!”

“Tell that to his Tweeter page,” said Damian in that bored manner again. Raven now stared at him in confusion. He finally met her eye, cocking an eyebrow as though he dared he to challenge it.

“What are you talking about?” she asked.

“Have you really not seen?” asked Damian dryly. He reached for his phone and seemed to look something up. When he showed it to her, Raven nearly dropped the device.

_Gents, no matter how much time your girl needs, make sure you give it to her and make sure you’re there when she needs you!_

Underneath was a picture of the two of them she recalled reluctantly taking when they first started this, whatever the hell they were this whole time. What disgusted her even more was the flood of enthusiastic responses.

“BB Rae?” Raven questioned, making a face.

“The official ship name,” Damian told her almost painfully, “for Beast Boy and Raven of the Titans.”

“Damnit, Garfield,” groaned Raven, sitting up in bed with her head in her hands. She had no idea he’d been doing this. Making them official online without her knowledge? What the hell.

But her anger froze cold as her phone vibrated and his name popped up on the screen. Whatever he’d done, this was the ninth time he was trying to get ahold of her to make sure she was alright.

She frowned deeply at the screen.

“You should pick up.”

Raven whirled her head around to stare disbelievingly at Damian, who was watching her with melted eyes.

“The team is going to be seriously worried about you, Raven,” he said softly. Raven grimaced and looked down at her phone again. Almost cursing herself, she picked it up and answered.

“Hi.”

_“Raven! Oh, thank God. Where are you? I came by your apartment just now and you weren’t there.”_

“I stayed the night, but came back to Wayne Manor,” she lied. She could feel Damian’s amusement behind her. “I wanted Dick to have his time with his father alone before I consulted him.”

_“Rae… I’m so sorry. Dick came back today and told Kori everything. We can’t believe Damian’s been alive this whole time.”_

“I can’t either,” Raven said truthfully. At that moment, said person wrapped his arms around her and kissed the bare of her shoulder.

_“When are you coming back? Are you really mad at him?”_

That was an obtuse question, Raven thought.

“A few days,” she told him. “Bruce and I are really talking. And then there’s Alfred… it’s a mess. I’ll be at training Monday morning.”

_“Do you… I mean, I… I can go to Gotham, if you want,”_ Garfield murmured as Damian kissed along Raven’s back, erupting goosebumps and getting her ready, “ _whatever you need. I’ll be there for you.”_

“Thank you, Gar,” she sighed, closing her eyes. A part of her felt awful that she was ready to drop the phone that very second. The rest of her was feeling too divine to care. “But this needs to be between us. I’ve been there for Bruce this whole time as he’s lied to me. It’s one of those one-on-one things.”

_“Okay. Well, when you come back then. Anything you need. I-“_

“I have to go,” said Raven quickly. She dropped her phone, ending the call guilt-free as she turned and collided impatiently with Damian, thinking in the back of her mind she’d find some way to let him down as easy as possible.

Nothing was keeping her from Damian ever again.

~

They had a great few days together.

Raven had to keep a hood up at almost all times but the hotel room so that no one could recognize her, and she felt the need to test every bit of room service sent up in case Grace poisoned it, but she found herself chuckling and out-right laughing more than she’d done in perhaps the last three years in total. They went to a snazzy bar that Raven recognized from the photos they’d first seen Damian remove the Red Hood helmet.

It was nighttime, but the classy room certainly wasn’t crowded. Raven loved the musky design of the place. She recognized the barman as the waiter who Damian had shaken hands within the photo. He was finely dressed with a clean-cut and elegant hair, seeming to be airing out some red wine for a customer.

“Mr. Ja-“ the waiter tried greeting as they took a seat, but Damian had stopped him short with a finger and leaned in. The barman mirrored his movement.

“It’s ‘Tim’ now, Matrix,” whispered Damian. The waiter straightened up immediately.

“Mr. Tim!” he cried buoyantly. Raven smirked as he sat out the glass of wine he’d been holding in front of her and attendant a beautiful blonde across the bar who was leaning in towards him eagerly.

“If I may, my lady, you strike me as the “on the rocks” type,” said Matrix smoothly. The blonde smiled wider.

“And what can I buy for _you?_ ” she asked. Matrix’s smile went more sly.

“A dealer never does his own supply, love,” he answered in cool fashion, “but your next round is on the house.”

Matrix put Raven and Damian through a sort of wine tasting and the new couple was surprised to learn that the other had a pallet well enough to match his father’s. It was a great night again. Raven wouldn’t have traded it for anything. Raven and Damian bid Matrix farewell for now, promising they’d return, and spent the night absorbed into each other.

~

The team was surprised to see her come Monday morning. Kori had approached her before training set off, concerned, but Raven told her (and the team, whom were listening) that she and Bruce buried the hatchet and that she would be doing a wine-tasting with him in a few days as a sort of peace-making act.

“I recall him telling me that,” came a voice. Raven tried not to pale as she turned around and saw Nightwing approach. Without his mask on, she stared into the blue of his eyes and knew he understood everything that had truly transpired.

“One of the vineyards he bought north of Gotham, right?” Nightwing covered for her, lying smoothly. Raven could only manage a meek smile and nod. Dick infinitesimally nodded with her, not breaking eye contact.

“I’m happy you two are getting along,” he said heavily. Kori beamed at him and the rest of the team watched on wearily.

Training had gone as swell as ever. Raven teamed with Jaime and fought until they were defeated by Wonder Girl and Superboy. Conner had tried to high five Donna, but she’d turned away as he raised his hand and walked stiffly off.

Which is what led to Conner grabbing Raven by the shoulder and turning her around as everyone tried to clear off for the day.

“Can we talk?” he asked politely. Raven nodded and saw Garfield watching them curiously. Sighing inwardly, she allowed Conner to lead them to the other side of the training facility for them to speak in private.

“What’s going on?” Raven asked, leaning against the wall. Conner looked uncomfortable and almost guilty of something.

“I was hoping for your advice on something,” he admitted with a sad undertone, “on… what I was hoping for…”

Raven raised a brow and felt exactly where this was unexpectedly going.

“You want to make things right with Donna.”

Conner looked up, a downwards turn at the corner of his mouth and nodded.

“She means more to me than anything,” Conner said to her, almost bitterly like it was a truth he had tried to avoid, “but she doesn’t even look at me most of the time. How do I get her to- I just want to say I’m sorry.” He looked desperate. “I don’t know how to do that. She forgave you for that… that night. Why has she never forgiven me?”

Raven winced at the memory. A party after a Titan’s victory gone horribly wrong. A kiss they never wanted to happen even ten minutes prior of it happening and never again once they’d finished the tryst.

“Yes, Conner, she forgave me,” sighed Raven, “but you never did anything. You tucked the deed under a rug and acted like she’d forget about it. I _apologized_. You didn’t. You didn’t explain to Donna it was a drunk blunder that you regretted and it wasn’t up to me to vouch for you. I was someone who also made a major mistake. Then you ran around some months later sleeping around with all of the _Superboy_ groupies you could get your hands on. You _chose_ not to remedy a bad situation with an open heart.”

Conner sheepishly rubbed a hand on the back of his neck, grimacing. “Yikes, Rae. Tell me how you really feel about it.”

Raven rolled her eyes, thinking he’d probably already done irreparable damage and wasn’t competent enough emotionally to fix whatever could be. But she helped, directing Conner on how best to get out what he felt inside and when she left, she was smiling, until the moment she ran into Beast Boy waiting outside for her with his arms crossed, that is.

“Hey,” was all he said, watching Raven cautiously with those yellow eyes.

“Hi,” she said back, waiting stiffly. She felt his emotions boiling in many different ways.

“How are you?” she asked to break the ice. She watched him sigh and start to walk over, putting her on edge. There was no way she could kiss him again. As sorry as she was for how Raven already knew this was going to end, she had no more desire whatsoever for Garfield. And it pained her to lead him on. Thankfully, he stopped a few feet away.

“I’m alright,” he said, “but how are you?”

“Alright,” she answered quickly, wondering if Damian was still waiting where she’d ask him to be. There was no way they could have planned for all these hold ups.

“Have you been avoiding me, Rae?” asked Garfield sadly. Raven grimaced, not wanting to give him an outright _yes._

“You know I needed my alone time, Beast Boy,” she said softly, wanting to cut out the intimacy of using his real name, “other than Kori, he was my best friend.”

Garfield nodded. “I know… but I miss you. Let’s hang out?”

Raven nodded, grimly setting it in her mind that she would tell him everything… just not yet.

“Soon,” she said, “Saturday morning, we’ll have tea and… talk.”

Garfield grinned at last. Raven was worried he’d come in for a kiss, in which case all this would come crashing down. Fortunately, he turned and waved, making off.

Not giving it another thought, Raven made sure the coast was clear as she teleported away.

~

Lavender tea perfumed Raven’s apartment and the helmet of the Red Hood decorated her dinner table like a centerpiece.

Fists clenching the sheets, Raven’s eyes rolled up as Damian railed her from behind. The claps of their sex were almost as loud as her moaning. Just a few more seconds as her toes curled and…

“Yes!” screamed Raven. “DAMIAN!” Biting her pillow to keep the volume down, Raven felt limp as she went out of breath but shakily kept active: Damian hadn’t finished this round yet.

Backed up against the wall, Damian stood naked, sweating, and firm as he watched Raven drop to her knees before him, emerald eyes consuming. Rubbing him out first with her pale hand, Raven took him in her mouth, keeping her amethyst eyes upon his face as his breathing went unsteady and he came undone. Raven felt his overpowering lust as he watched her give him head, her cheeks sucking as it went in and out quickly. His eyes shut and teeth clenched down hard as he got near to tipping the edge. Raven left the head of him in her mouth and let him finish there with a loud groan, gasping her name.

She swallowed and wiped her mouth. It wasn’t so bad anymore. And the great satisfaction of her true partner was more than worth it in Raven’s eyes.

The night followed with their bodies entangled. Each time feeling better than the last, every moment perfectly performed. Raven loving everything he did. Nothing less than satisfactory.

Damian slightly trembled as he gently held her hand in bed, pressing their foreheads together. Raven lost in a world of green. Damian lost in a story of deep violet.

Raven had to know something.

“Would you stop killing?” she asked in a whisper.

“Would you leave the Titans?” he asked just as softly.

There was no need to say anymore. The answer for the other was in their eyes all too clearly.

~

Much of the next few days were like this. Training in the morning. A quick talk with her team, dodging Garfield, chuckling at Conner trying to get closer and closer to Donna, loving the looks between Kori and Dick, and then seeing Damian in every second of free-time she had.

What was amazing was when Bruce had called her. He did from time-to-time, but this time it was because Raven figured Nightwing had let him in on the secret whom she was spending her days with. Perhaps he had wanted to know how it was going, or what kind of influence she was having over his son’s other life. Or maybe it was he just wished to hear his voice in the background.

“We should go talk to him,” said Raven as she’d hung up the call. Damian was shirtless at the suite’s table, eating some pickup ramen from Icharo’s that Raven had brought.

“Why?” asked Damian nastily. Raven raised an eyebrow at him.

“He misses you,” she said, “Alfred, too. As much as I hate to think of it this way… Bruce is actually the only reason you’re still here. He walked away from Talia reviving you instead of stopping her.”

Damian scowled, but nodded. “Fine. The weekend.”

“Friday,” Raven set, not wanting him to push it off any longer. “I’m taking us over there right after training.”

Damian shrugged, his eyes glancing down Raven’s body, who was in only her underwear, obviously interested in more pressing matters. Raven smiled softly, tossing her phone aside, but heard it going off the moment it hit the counter. She glanced back at it, then realized it wasn’t hers going off at all, but Damian’s. She checked the screen.

_I miss you so much Jason! Please come back for this!_

A picture of a completely naked blondie accompanied the message. Raven moved her narrowed eyes from her fake breasts to Damian sitting there with an innocent expression on his face.

“What?” he asked, eyebrows crinkled. She showed him the text and he looked taken back. “That was from a long time ago.”

“Your list is never-ending,” said Raven irritably, typing into the phone.

“What are you doing?” asked Damian curiously, lifting his head up to get a better angle.

“Blocking her,” answered Raven shortly. Damian laughed loudly.

~

Friday came with a very interesting way to start off the day. Raven had walked into the Titans conference room shortly after seven, at a time when she supposed the rest of the team were still getting ready at their respective residences, to find Kori butt naked, riding Dick passionately.

“Raven!” she squealed, turning in horror over her shoulder and covering her breasts. Diving quickly out of the room, Raven made her way down the hall in a hurry just to make sure no one else was coming. Thankfully, the coast was clear. She waited down the hall trying to clear that image forever from her mind, an act that wasn’t helped by Starfire appearing at her side fifteen minutes later, walking skittishly.

“I’m sorry you had to see that,” she began awkwardly.

“You know people have bedrooms for that sort of thing,” said Raven, not looking at Kori at all, pink in the face.

“It wasn’t planned,” said Starfire, “it just… happened.”

Raven let out a deep breath, praying for patience and understanding and maturity. And for this situation to not be so awkward. But she had just caught an eyeful of her best friend’s backside. She turned to meet Kori in her apologetic green eyes, trying not to wince.

“Has it _been_ happening?” she asked conversationally. An uptick came to Kori’s mouth.

“A few times,” she admitted, “over the last few days. We haven’t even talked about it yet, but… yeah.”

Raven almost wanted to cover her ears. But instead she closed her eyes and said, “I guess I’m happy for you guys. Seems as if it’s working out.”

Kori glowed and her eyes swooned. “Maybe,” she said.

Training went a little differently that day. Easy drills of partnering up and attacking. Raven was surprised to see Wallace and Cassandra work so well together, even more so at the comradery Donna and Conner showed. She clapped his hand after they pulled out a perfect assault and Raven wondered if he’d actually talked to her and managed to work things out.

When training was over, Nightwing and Starfire addressed the team side-by-side.

“Batman has caught up with Damian,” Nightwing announced loudly, “it seems that he’s gotten through. Red Hood… shouldn’t be a problem anymore.”

“That guy,” muttered Conner grimly.

“Oh, _hermano,”_ said Jaime with real concern and sad eyes.

Raven looked at the team leaders back and forth after Nightwing’s obvious lies. She felt Kori seemed to be… in the know.

Either way, the Titans dropped their man-hunt master board for the Red Hood. And Raven left the room with a wide smile when they were dismissed before anyone could stop and chat with her.

“You know I don’t expect this to go well,” said Damian a couple of hours later.

“Neither do I if that’s your attitude,” said Raven dryly. Damian gave her a short look before gesturing for her to proceed. Doing so, Raven created a portal from thin air for them both to walk through. She stepped through first, turning and admiring Damian’s first steps back into Wayne Manor in over three years. His emerald eyes looked around the foyer as the light of her energy faded.

“Time doesn’t change this place,” was what he said.

“I believe that was always the intent, Master Damian.”

They both turned to the right and saw Alfred Pennyworth standing in the doorway. Ever the regal gentleman, Alfred’s face did not betray the swelling emotions Raven felt coming from deep inside him.

“Pennyworth,” said Damian, his jaw twitching. He couldn’t stop his eyes widening as a man whom was almost his exact duplicate, but just over doubled his age and with blue eyes, joined Alfred at the shoulder.

“Father…”

Bruce praised his son. Their jaws worked in the same exact fashion.

“You’re nearly as tall as me now…”

~

It had gone better than ever expected. There wasn’t laughing and hugging like normal family reunions (there never were with these people, Raven knew) but to her that only made it seem more real.

She listened rather than talked as conversations flowed together effortlessly. Alfred even sat down for once.

The only heat that appeared was a friendly debate between Bruce and Damian of what Chateau vineyard was better. Raven rolled her eyes at that one.

“Raven informs me you’re still seeing the criminal,” said Damian, setting his glass down that evening.

“Ex-criminal,” Bruce reminded them all, flashing his royal blue eyes to Raven fondly.

“There are no such things as…” Damian had begun, but after stopping and thinking it through, he muttered, “well, maybe there are.”

And the rest of them were glad to hear it.

They spent the night in Raven’s room rather than Damian’s old one. He felt that that was something, too, that he needed to let go. The next morning, he had a hand over her mouth as they performed their forenoon ritual. But she had to decline a late breakfast at the manor.

“I can’t, today’s the day I meet Gar,” she told Damian, feeling sick about it again. The sun was getting higher and she was late. “I’ll be back in a few hours, I promise…”

Damian was a gentleman about it, maturely understanding the sensitivity of her situation. Gratefully, she let him kiss her knuckles before she departed, hoping to get in a quick shower at her place before she met him at her usual spot for tea.

Raven landed back in her own living room and wiped her forehead. She was still feeling hot from their quickie. Knowing she was still sweating from it, she idly wondered what to throw on as she’d probably be taking off for Wayne Manor right after.

Stopping dead cold as she heard a familiar whooshing sound from behind her as she pushed her bedroom door open.

Turning around slowly, she saw Beast Boy sitting at her kitchen table with his hands folded, staring at the ground with an unusual mirthless face. It was as if someone had zapped kindness and joy right out of him.

“Beast Boy,” breathed Raven, “what- what are you doing _in_ here?” she asked, afraid of whatever his answer was going to be.

Garfield Logan still stared at the woodwork of her floor with a sorrowful expression. “You were late,” he said softly, “I waited on you at the coffee shop. Thought maybe you’d just slept in.” His eyes made a slow glance at the two tall takeaway cups on her table. In her distractedness, she missed everything.

“Thought I’d come spoil you with how I could,” he said, still not looking at her, “and when you weren’t here, I thought I’d wait. I had a plan. So I turned into a cute Labrador puppy, just curled up on the chair waiting for you… I thought you’d like that…”

Raven felt cold as he shut his eyes tightly in pain.

“I swear I can still smell him on you…”

Raven’s throat tightened. A part of her felt disgusted she couldn’t even think of a genuine apology. She’d planned to let him down in any way not like _this_.

Garfield stood tall and his somber yellow eyes found Raven at last. They were empty for the first time Raven had ever known him.

“You could have told me,” he choked, that breaking emotion coming through, “you could have told me, Rae. I didn’t have to find out like this.”

Raven shut her eyes to block it out. “I am so sorry… I know you don’t deserve this.”

“No, I don’t,” Garfield agreed quietly. He waited for her eyes to open, but they didn’t. Obviously, she just wanted this to go away. Garfield tightly swallowed as he realized she didn’t even want him to fight for her.

“It’s always been him, hasn’t it?” he demanded throatily. Raven nodded, tears threatening to form behind her closed eyelids.

“Yes,” she managed, “I’m sorry. It’s never not been him.”

She felt him breaking, but couldn’t manage herself to watch. “I’m such a fool…” was all she heard. Then steps came and her door opened and closed. The noise faded, but the grief she’d placed in his heart was still there, blaring to the heavens.


End file.
